Potato Dextrin Resist

I love creating fabric and have always been fascinated by resists. I love the "crackled" look which traditional hot wax batik will produce but don't like working with hot wax. A good alternative is the corn or potato starches. It's a finer looking crackle but still a neat effect. Pro Chemical sells the potato and corn dextrin for this technique.
To start, make the starch by mixing potato dextrin and water into a thickened paste, directions on package. Set this aside or refrigerate until ready to use (can be refrigerated for a limited time0.
Use a piece of insulation board - around 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick and pin the fabric down (right side up) very tight @ every 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch. As the paste is applied and allowed to dry, it shrinks and cracks.

Place the pins at an angle with the top of the pin going outward and the bottom of the pin going in, which stretches the fabric more tightly.

Next, apply the paste. It was an experiment of sorts to see how thick to apply it; the thicker areas were  more crackled. A thin layer allows you to see the fabric underneath; a thicker layer will conceal the fabric. Allow the paste to dry thoroughly overnight. You will see it starting to crack as it dries.

Next,  apply the color to "fill" in the cracked areas. Use a thickened dye (preferred) or a fabric paint such as Set a Color. A dye will leave the fabric softer, a paint will alter the hand of the fabric. I use a procion dye (mixed with soda ash) and thickened with sodium alginate. Next photo is fabric covered with potato dextrin solution.

To avoid extensive pinning, which is time consuming, you can also hoop it as seen in the picture below.

And now to apply the dye; it should be thick enough to conceal the fabric underneath.

Cover with plastic to keep the fabric moist and the dyes reacting. Let sit overnight.

Remove the dye by first rinsing in a laundry tub first to remove excess dye. Next, wash in cold water, then hot water with synthrapol. The water should run clear. It's a subtle and interesting look.

There's a flour resist technique which I'm anxious to try. I may do so this week which is supposed to be rainy and therefore good studio days. 

Craggy Gardens, NC

John and I do a lot of short trips in the fall; we love the weather and of course the beautiful fall foliage. Recently we ventured up the Blue Ridge Parkway which is a national treasure; it runs from Virginia to Georgia. It's a 2 lane well paved country road; it meanders over and through the tops of the Blue Ridge mountains. It's slow going along this route, but the scenery will take your breath away. It runs through Asheville, NC so we can pick it up easily. Even trips to the mall will tempt me to take this route, I never tire of it. Our destination for this day was Craggy Gardens where the spookiest and craggiest of trees live. I see how it got its name.

I'm always fascinated by these trees and must have a hundred pictures already.

Love this next one with the peeling bark....

They have a "lacey look".

Onto even more spookier territory, the deep dark forests - love it!

And the beautiful views along the way; you could see forever, it seems!

And the Asheville Water Reservoir - a speck in the distance.

I love the colorful berries in the foreground.

Such a perfect day!

Our Adventure in Boone, NC

My PTA group planned a trip to Boone, NC to see a fiber art exhibit at the Turchin Center for the Visual Arts. We were off and running in 3 cars and arrived in Boone around 11 am - just in time for lunch!
and the second half of the group minus Janice (the top of her head can be seen).

We drove to the Turchin Center where this very nice lady offered to take our group picture. I don't think she realized how many cameras were involved - click, click, click, click. She was a good sport.

The exhibit "12 Voices", sponsored by SAQA (Studio Art Quilts Associates) is a traveling exhibit featuring the works of 12 fiber artists and members of SAQA. Each artist submitted 4-5 pieces for the exhibit. My only disappointment was that I hoped to see all the works, not realizing that each gallery due to space limitations could only display just so many. None the less, it was still wonderful and inspiring. Some of the featured artists included Linda Colsh, Joan Schulze, Judith Content, Susan Shie, Clare Plug, Angela Moll and others. There was "no photography" but you could purchase a book of the exhibit featuring all the works, the artists and a short synopsis of how they work. I've poured over the book many times since yesterday and it's wonderful, beautiful photography and an interesting look into the personalities of these incredibly talented women. The show was hung beautifully, paying careful attention to those pieces with great "back" interest, allowing them to hang in a freestanding manner. One could walk around these pieces with a view from all angles.

After the exhibit, we ventured downtown, a charming college town with the usual hustle and bustle of student life.

And then onto Cathy's condo for beautiful views

and interesting table tops; don't you love the leaves!

We had our usual Show and Tell which is always inspiring. Mary Stori made a small piece for Connie having to do with a Pelican story Connie shared with us a while back. Mary is great for doing this, listening carefully to our stories and then surprising someone with a small and very personal piece she has created to depict that story. So now we are all trying to think of our best stories to casually drop in Mary's presence in hopes of getting one of her fantastic pieces.

Here is the wonderful piece and notice the beading on the edge!

And another one of Mary's pieces completely beaded!

Kate Weston did this next piece for a challenge for the Quilters of South Carolina conference this weekend. Kate marbled her own fabric and did a great job. The first step in marbling is to drop the paint which makes the "stones" pattern. This can be raked into another pattern or printed as is. Kate took a stylus and ran it through the stones (circles) to make the indent at the top and pulling out at the bottom to make the point at the bottom of the heart. I think it's fantastic. The binding still needs stitching but I'm so glad she brought it to share.

Kate covered the outside wide border with a gauze type fabric which subdued the marbling and gave it incredible texture. What a clever idea!

What a wonderful day, my mind is still spinning with inspiration from the exhibit and time spent with good friends.

Silk Fusion

The Fiber Arts Alliance group in Asheville, NC had a very inspiring meeting this month. Deb Brown did the program demonstrating how to make something called silk fusion. Being a lover of silk, this really caught my eye.  Deb started with silk rovings; a roving is a cleaned strand of fiber from which threads and yarns are made. They take color beautifully as you can see in the picture below.
To start: Wear rubber gloves; lay a piece of wax paper or plastic down first, followed by a piece of tulle. The fibers come next and in no particular order. It's fun to mix several colors together.

Place the rovings so that are around 1" high. It seems way high but wait and see.

Cover the rovings with a second piece of tulle.

Mix 3 parts water to 1 part textile medium; drip over the top until the rovings are wet. A word about textile medium; it can be found in craft stores, it's the binder in fabric paint which allows permanent bonding heat set.

Using your hands, smooth the wet rovings over.

At this point, you can add glitter and other types of small glitz to the surface.

It looks better of you smooth out the glitter.

Lightly sponge over the top to remove the excess medium.

Let dry before removing the tulle.

This is a piece of finished silk fusion. It can be cut into shapes, stitched by hand or machine and while wet, molded into shapes. It's very versatile and interesting.

Deb shared her notebook of techniques with us, what a great idea!

A great meeting as always

If Walls Could Talk I

I have lots of pictures and documents, many of which are over 100 years old and luckily were passed down to me. How lucky for me that my family were "savers". I've enjoyed manipulating these photos and documents in my photo editing program. After taking a weeklong workshop with Pat Mink, I became interested with a technique she taught us for layering photos together. With this technique I started layering pictures of people (many of them ancestors) on top of old walls, windows, rock surfaces etc. I liked the "ghost-like" image that appeared. I've often thought when being in an older place, what stories it could conjure up - if only walls could talk, and the idea of a series was born. This first piece features a picture of my grandmother at the age of 17, and around the time she was married. It's always been one of my favorite photos. Ethel Layla was born in the late 1800s. I layered her photo over a rock wall with a doorway of sorts. I like the effect as it's very subtle;  you have to look carefully to see her face.
A detail

Most of the fabric I created myself; this part was dyed and silk screened with trees, which I love. I don't know if my grandmother loved trees as I do, but she was a wonderful gardener.

This part features writing printed from a silk screen. The screen was made using a page from my mother's autograph book from the 1930s. I use this screen a lot; next to it is a screen of Thistles.

More screen printing details and a stamp using words. There's also a bit of hand embroidery - cross stitch, something I haven't done in a while.

I use this next screen a lot also as I like the use of words and script in my work. This is a page from my other grandmothers cookbook done in her writing. It's just a recipe for apple cake but I love the idea that she wrote it; I think it adds interest and a personal touch.

I have about 5 other fabric prints ready to go, I'm anxious to see how they'll turn out.

Flocked Fabric Printing

Do you remember the old fashioned fabric - dotted Swiss? Once in a while I'll be in a fabric store and come upon it; it has a very distinct (and nice) smell to it. If I close my eyes, a sniff of this fabric will transport me back in time to Easter outfits, party dresses and a new dress for the first day of school. My mother who sewed all my clothes made many dresses out of flocked and especially dotted Swiss fabric. I loved it then and love it now. I don't know if it's the memories it evokes or just the prettiness of it. To me it's just wondrous - even when it's not.
On a recent trip to a fabric outlet, I spotted a piece of fabric on the way out the door. I had to have it, so I went back inside and waited on line again for measuring and pricing. You see - it was a flocked fabric and not one of the prettier ones as far as the actual fabric goes. The background was synthetic, shiny and slippery - not something I would use, but the flocked design was amazing! My thoughts immediately went to using it for printing. The relief of the flocking was high enough to place a fabric over it and using a brayer, maybe, just maybe a design would appear.
So I taped the fabric onto my work table.

I used a fairly thick textile screening paint so it would not migrate. I used a piece of plastic to hold the paint and ran the brayer over and through it until it appeared evenly on the brayer.

Next I taped a piece of fabric over the flocked fabric and rolled the brayer over the top. I used a gentle touch, too much pressure could lose the design. I wasn't sure if it would work, but Yes! Success!

The color is not real even, that might take some practice, but honestly, I think I prefer it this way - it's more interesting. If I were making a whole cloth for a garment, I would strive for an even application or depth of color but I'll be cutting this up to use in quilts.

You can see the light areas where there was little paint left on the brayer and the heavier color areas from the starting point.

It's a really nice, organic looking image and think I'll find many places to use it.

Fabric as a printing tool - Who'ld thought!