In the weekend I dyed this piece of fairly fine woollen fabric with Gum tree leaves I collected from the ground. They were mostly red coloured.
And this is a detail. I was really pleased with the range of colours.
I used a slosh of aluminium foil dissolved in white vingar as a mordant .
Well, not very felted, not even a little bit felted in fact. But it looks quite cool with all the safety pins and ragged edges. Back to the drawing board, after a cup of tea.
I have been trying to felt some pieces of previously dyed blanket
without much success. For this sample I cut narrow strips (about an inch wide), handwove them, stitched along the top to hold them together and tried to hand felt them. And it fell apart.
Undaunted I cut some more strips, wider this time (about 4 cms) and wove and pinned them ready for the hot wash in the washing machine, with some other thing to increase the agitation. Don't you love my great measurung system - a foot in both camps?
And I have been looking at the work of Ruth Hadlow - so cool.
I wove this the other day on a piece of calico using pieces of old lace, net and torn or cut lingere. Then I washed it so that the edges would fray and the fabric would tangle - which it dutifully did.
It has a lovely delicate tangled look, like my mind sometimes !!!!!!
Yesterday I boiled up some gum tree bark, hoping I might get some orangey colour - thinking about the terrible fires in Australia.
The pure colour is a sort of orangey/golden colour and when I added aluminium and copper it went a wonderful dark olive green.
I have some wool tops sitting in the pure colour to see what will happen. I don't want to boil them and shock them so they felt and matt before I use them. I will check them tomorrow.
I still have silk wrapped around a punga tree and I am waiting to see what happens. The branch against it on the outside has been rubbing against it in the wind and is leaving a mark.
I tried to put silk in my pohutukawa snake, cover it with plastic and anchor with stones.
I even tried to spray it with salt water - to no avail. The wind just whipped it away.
And dear Zorro thought he might try sleeping in my batting drawer.
This is a line up of all the work I did in the weekend. I found two more as I was tidying.
This one has graphite with the wax. It is really great because when the wax is heated the graphite can be pushed aound in the wax.
And this one has fabric in it. The fabric is american scrim, really loosely woven guaze, and comes out through the surface.
Last weekend I went to an Encaustic painting course which was awesome. We used layers of hot wax and pigment to create all sorts of images. I my work I used fabric to try and layer and trap fabric and threads.
This is the studio we worked in. Diane is using a gas torch to heat her work.
This is a piece I did using my eco dyed fabrics and layering them within the wax. There was a crack in the board with sort of became part of the composition.
And this is a piece with layered threads and small pieces of fabric.
I have cut up two pieces of blanket and woven them together and placed two strips of dyed silk beside them - thinking about felting and stitching. The strips are about 3 inches wide - I am thinking I may cut them down and start really small.
Getting closer.......
It is an ordinary government building from about 1960, very solid and sort of common and no leaks and no mould. We have a lovely studio area and can watch wood pigeons flying and hear lots of tuis, bell birds and other native birds singing. The grounds are awesome. It is set on the Eastern Hills of the Hutt Valley and they are just covered in native bush. I live on the Western Hills so it is just so close.
And we have a duck pond with a Mr Duck who comes out at about noon I am told, and this morning it had the most beautiful reflections of the building and the hills behind it.
