Printing with Thickened Dyes

Our Fiber Junkies group met a little while back to do some deconstructive screen printing. It should be sunny in order for the screens to dry....however, Mother Nature had other ideas...knowing that the plants needed water more then we needed sun. But not to worry, our group will always have a way to play and have fun. We used the thickened dyes to print on our soda ash prepared fabric.

 I brought lots of "misfits"...those fabrics close to being tossed and figured they couldn't get any worse.

 Like this piece printed in fuschia ....

 was laid on plastic and a thin coat of thickened dye rolled over it using a brayer.

 An inexpensive, spongy stamp from a craft store was used to "reverse print" and remove color when stamped on top.

 I like what is happening and hope it washes out to something pretty and useable.

 This also used a checkerboard stamp (same type as above) to remove color...

 and this piece used a sponge roller with raised dot shapes to roll the design on top...We all loved this tool.

 Here is one of them washed...think it needs a silk screen on top to finish it off.

 This was dye applied to crinkled plastic and then

 this wonderful fabric that Kate's husband got when he bought "healthy shoes" was gifted to me to use....

 which I did and anxious to see the final piece.

 Denny was wearing a wonderful work T- shirt she printed on and also used as a clean up rag. I must remember to do that next time.

 This very ordinary piece was printed with ferns.

 I coated the leaves with dye and printed on top of the fabric.

  This piece already had paint on it but needed something more so using an old printing block with the letter J, I printed with dyes. The dyes will not take in the areas of the paint as they can't permeate the fabric so it makes for an interesting affect.

 This piece used the ferns as a resist...

 laying them down, placing a blank silk screen on top and pulling dye over it. Removing the leaves shows the original fabric.

 I liked this one where the fern served as a stamp.

 A very wispy, light look to the piece.

 This had quite a bold base to start with so putting the fern on top was a good idea, I think....will find out soon.

 This was some kind of metal stencil Denny brought which was bold and quite effective.

 One of the pieces created with it....

 Of everything I did, think I like the botanicals the best...

And this one.....We had a wonderful day...I didn't get to take pics of my girlfriends work.....just kept forgetting...but they did some great stuff and we're all to bring our pieces to the next meeting.