Photo(s) Friday

Appreciating the amazing beauty of bleached snail shells.

Collage #37

This collage didn't quite turn out the way I had envisioned. The ground was made from laying bleeding tissue paper on the journal page then spritzing water on top. After the tissue paper dried, I removed it and the paper underneath was intensely stained. I liked the design as is but I pushed myself to layer on top of it. 

Initially, I glued yellow and green tissue paper on top of the stained ground. After the glue dried, the tissue paper wasn't visible so I brushed yellow and green acrylic paint on top. I didn't like the way the collage was turning out with the yellow and green stripes. I got out black acrylic paint and splattered over the whole piece. I'm much happier with the collage even though it's not as successful as some of my other collages. Also, I'm not sure if it's a true collage. It's has layers of paint not paper.

Photo(s) Friday

The last couple of months for some reason I've turned into a morning person. One of the benefits is seeing the amazing colors of each sunrise. These two photos were taken on the same morning around the same time but different location. 

This photo was taken from the backyard.

This photo was taken from the front yard.

Beyond the Edge Fiber Artists - "My Inner Self Portrait" exhibit

I'm honored to be a member of a local fiber art group called Beyond the Edge. Our first exhibit for 2015, My Inner Self Portrait, will be premiering at Road to California.  

January 22-25, 2015

Thursday - Saturday 9 AM - 6 PM 

Ontario Convention Center

2000 East Convention Center Way

Ontario, CA 91764

"My Inner Self Portrait"

A fine arts fiber exhibit exploring aspects of self-portraiture. In this exhibit the artist was asked to look beyond the mere physical and instead present an inner view. The art work may reflect how the artist sees themselves at this time, or at a formative moment in their life. Each piece reveals something unique to the individual and at the same time, that which is universal to all.

My piece is called Becoming Me. This artwork is a part of the “Peel Away The Layers” series that I started when I was approaching my 50th birthday.  I realized that I was peeling away the layers to become the woman that I am today.  Underneath the layers is a slightly wonky, colorful woman.

SolarFast Printed Fabric Projects

I started to work on some artwork using the fabric I printed with SolarFast. I blogged about using SolarFast here. 

Most of the fabric I'm using for a large artwork that I will post at a later time. There were so many good size scraps left over that I decided to create 4 smaller pieces. The majority of each piece will be hand stitched. At the moment, I'm really inspired by the look and process of hand stitching. The finished size of each piece will be 8" x 10" and mounted on sketcher bars. I'm not sure if I'm going to frame the artwork yet. I'll decide once all 4 pieces are completed.

The first piece is almost done. Due to the size of the artwork, the hand stitching is going pretty fast. I'm haven't done too much hand stitching so the stitching isn't perfect. The process is really cathartic. I will post the finished artwork once they are all done. 

Artwork #1

Close up of Artwork #1

Another close up of Artwork #1

Artwork #2

Artwork #3

Artwork #4

SolarFast Sunprints

Initially, I had bought some SolarFast dyes for a specific fiber project that I wanted to use old negatives to mark the fabric. The negatives didn't have enough contrast for the SolarFast dyes to work properly. Instead of storing away the dyes, I decided to use it for sunprinting. The hand of SolarFast is softer than using Setacolor Transparent Fabric Paint but the colors are not as intense. You have to use a lot of SolarFast to get deep, rich color.

The black fabric on the left is SolarFast black. The black fabric on the right is watered down Setacolor Transparent Fabric Paint Black. Both fabrics are yield good prints but you can see the difference.

If you're printing small leaves like these olive tree leaves then use plexiglass to secure the objects.

I had picked up a large (15" x 14") leaf on my morning walk.  I thought it would be fun to see how it would print. I brushed on a combination of brown and burnt orange dye for this print. 

This large leaf held up pretty good so I able to make multiple prints using different color SolarFast. I realized that the wonderful veining of the leaf didn't show. I'm thinking of adding the veining using thread...maybe hand stitching with embroidery floss.

When I noticed how fast it was to print the fabric, I started grabbing different foliage and fabric. I sewed strips of undyed fabric together then brushed on the Avocado SolarFast and laid the leaves on top. I like the raw look of this print.

A friend gave me a yard of sheer polyester fabric. This print using the Avocado SolarFast has a nice soft look to it.

This print was made using pine needles with Avocado and Brown SolarFast.

 On future posts, I will show the artwork made from these fabrics.

Collage #36

I'm slightly obsessed with using bleeding tissue paper on my quick sketch collages. The serendipitous nature of spritzing water on top of the tissue paper to see how it will distress is very intriguing to me. It's not a new technique but it's one that I'm currently exploring. In this post, I'm going to explain my process of distressing the tissue paper and creating Collage #36.

Here is the finished Collage #36. 

The first step is to cut up the bleeding tissue paper in different colors and sizes. For Collage #36 I decided to distress the tissue paper on top of the journal page I'm going to use for the collage. The journal page along with the tissue paper will be distressed at the same time.

I first placed a large piece of white tissue paper on top of the journal page. Then laid smaller pieces of black and red tissue paper on top. Overlapping a bit. When  the water is lightly spritzed on top, the ink will run. You can see where the black ink is bleeding on to the red and white tissue paper.

Wait until the tissue paper is dried before separating the pieces. The stain on the journal page is well defined. The journal page will be the first layer of the collage.

The next step was adding red tissue paper that wasn't distressed. The distressed red tissue paper was too busy for this collage. I love the way the stained journal page is showing through the red tissue paper. 

The final step was adding 3 torn pieces of the distress black tissue paper with white dots on top.

I didn't use all the tissue paper that I distressed on this collage. It will be saved for future projects.

I hope you liked this post and inspired to try bleeding tissue paper in your artwork.

Collage #35 - First Quick Sketch Collage of 2015

I really enjoyed making Quick Sketch Collages in 2014. I was inspired to continue working on this project for 2015 because I need to work on adding layers of texture and color to my collages. Also, I'm having fun making and using bleeding tissue paper.

The collages will be made on a more serendipitous matter. When I am inspired...when I am creatively block...when I need a break from a deadline driven project.

Here is Collage #35 - the first quick sketch collage of 2015 along with the steps taken along the way.

I decided to start the collage by adding a full sheet of unmarked bleeding tissue paper. I thought it would be a good ground for the collage.

I played around with different pieces of marked bleeding tissue paper.

I liked how some pieces overlapped and some pieces left space between each other. A slight hint of the green tissue paper underneath added another design element.

I cautiously added the uneven yellow circles. 

Normally, I like simple, uncluttered artwork. This year I want to push myself to add layers of texture and color while keeping my style. As with the collages from 2014, not all of the collages will be successful. I will learn from every collage - successful or not.