linens and Klee

For some time I have been buying old napkins and tablecloths at yard sales. I think it started because I had some I had inherited, but I couldn't bring myself to do anything with them...my philosophy usually is 'use it, they'll make more', but something stopped me from using those exact ones. So I bought other people's discards.

I love the feel of them, the texture, the way the patterns are subtle but still distinctive. I've even done some compost dyeing with some of the tablecloths.

But recently I started playing with dyeing them. I'm not sure of their fiber content, but I think they're linen. If they're not, they're cotton. Either way, they take Procion Mx dyes wonderfully. I do multiple dye baths to get a range of color in them (which I plan to exploit with a bleach pen soon).

At the same time, I was drawn back to a bird I keep drawing. I had started him from a petroglyph I saw online somewhere, but thanks to an article about Morris Graves on the Ragged Cloth blog, I was reminded of the ones that the abstract expressionists made. Including one of my favorites, Paul Klee.

So when I saw the color and depth of one batch of the napkins, I wanted to recreate that feeling, the low key value system, the texture, the mystery. Here is the result of the first one:


The bird was sketched with Shiva paint sticks. He looks off the edge of the piece, almost sadly. I then machine quilted it heavily, but the piece seemed a little too bright. So I fused on some black Misty Fuse, torn into abstract shapes. Better. But they are a little too shiny.

So I've started yet another series...this piece is named 'After Klee'.

etsy and me

I've decided to set up an etsy shop to sell some of my smaller pieces. I'm hearing good things about it, so I'm giving it a try. As of today, you can find it here.
It includes some watercolor pieces, too. And soon I will add other things, including pieces I've shown on this blog. Many of those pieces are for sale, if you're interested, come to my website and hit the 'contact the artist' button.

Here's a sample of something I just listed: (click here to see)

The marketplace for art, at least here in the Midwest, seems to be in flux, so I'm trying what I can. I'm not doing any art fairs this year, I'm trying to get into more galleries, keeping my website current, and now this. All I know for sure is that the work won't sell sitting in my closet.

website update

I've been busy updating my website, adding more work to it. Some of it is new, like this:

But most of it is older stuff that I just hadn't gotten around to adding--the slow part is getting them photographed.

But now that most of the pieces I want to have are on there, I can start doing the detail stuff, like adding 'next' and 'previous' so you can page through the gallery...check it out by clicking here.

lazertran continued

Well, I got up my nerve and started working with the 'good' image transfers. I put them on a nice, heavy silk. They came out a little less bright, but that was okay. I picked out three that seemed to go together--closeups of hedge apples that I had played with in Photoshop Elements. I put fusing on the back, decided they would make a nice set of pieces, and started to think about backgrounds. Microwave silk dyeing came to the rescue, I used dark brown and then an acid green to produce a mottled background.

Recently I found some square gallery wrapped artist canvases at WalMart on clearance. At this point, I had pretty much decided to go for a triptych, with each third mounted on a canvas whose edges I had painted to coordinate.

So I cut a piece of the background to size, and started playing. I quickly realized that I wanted to cut into the transfers, a scary moment. But I can always make more. I cut out the hedge apple, then cut some freehand shapes from the remaining part of the picture. Here is the result of the first one:


In some ways I liked it better without the quilting, but it needed the structure to hang correctly. The edges are heat singed to prevent raveling.

The next one continues the theme, but changes it some:




I'm working with the notion of earth being the only planet we've got, that all life that we know about springs from it, and that the hedge apple is a metaphor for that whole idea. So here, the stringy things are either going into the sphere or coming out, depending on my frame of mind.

The third part of the triptych continues the theme, with another variation:



The sphere is farther away, and there is more negative space.

Now the payoff, the three of them together:



I like the way this piece is coming together. The strings become more organized as you look up, the apple is bigger. Now all I have to do is paint the canvases and mount the pieces to them. And post them to my website. And maybe enter them in some shows...

So lazertran does have its uses. I still probably won't buy more right now, because of the difficulty of borrowing a laser printer...but they do have an inkjet version now...

more playing around

I keep acquiring new things to play with. A while back I bought, without knowing what I would do with, a box of D'uva ChromaCoal heat fixable pastels. I have used them a time or two in small amounts, but lately I've tried to use them like I would regular pastels, using fabric instead of paper. Some of the new stuff on my website involves the use of them, particularly "Maclura Rising" .

But the other day I started just playing with them with no end product in mind. This is the result, so far, of that play.



I did the black first, just sketching with the side of the pastel. Since I was in 'play mode', I decided to color the osage oranges. And thus discovered the limitations of at least this particular set of ten colors--they're very bright, not easy to tone down, and the color choices aren't great. They don't seem to be true primaries. They're a little difficult to blend together. What I ended up doing was drawing in the colors, then using an old toothbrush to blend themas much as possible. Yes, that's an unconventional tool, but it was handy. The colors of the piece are, however, really this bright.

So the pastels have potential. Heat setting them is no big deal--you can do it with an iron. And for some pieces, I like this loose, drawing style. I have also used them occasionally to touch up a color on a piece. If you can find them (I think I got mine at Dick Blick), they're a handy addition to the studio.

playing around

I've been playing with some Lazertran silk transfer paper. I bought it with high hopes, only to have them dashed when I found out that copy places wouldn't let me put it in their copiers. And the only other thing it works on is color laser printers, which I don't have. I finally found one I could borrow, so I used up the pack and am now figuring out what I can do with the images.

There are five that I am really interested in. So I've been playing with the other two. I've found out enough that I don't think I will buy any more, but I do see how it could be used.

This first transfer is on heavy silk, crepe satin I think. The original picture was of sand that was being furrowed by the waves. It was almost monotonal, which explains why it doesn't work so well.


I quilted it heavily with varigated thread. The edge had gotten messed up because I hurried the transfer process, so I added some Jacquard silk paint and let it flow. The piece is ok, but it doesn't really shine.

The next picture was a close-up of an autumn leaf, which had been manipulated in Photoshop Elements. To this I have started hand couching some silk yarn made from silk scraps. I like the look, but it seems like there will just be overall texture and color, with no focal point.


But this idea shows promise as a technique for the 'good' transfers.

As a last trial, I transferred the image to silk organza. It's hard to tell, but it's a picture of a manatee in a clear pool of water. But the fabric is problematic--it tends to distort every time I handle it, you can feel the transfer on this (and not so much on the others). I'm drawn to the image, but can't figure out how to use it in a finished piece.


So I've learned a little, but I'm still a little scared of starting with the 'good' pieces--only one shot at getting it right. On the other hand, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Sometimes, maybe lots of times, art is about taking a leap of faith. It may be the only way to get to something new, something fresh.

thread sketching

Somehow I got way behind on reading the magazines I get about fiber art--Quilting Arts, Fiber Arts, the Surface Design Association Journal. As I caught up with them, I started seeing pieces that made me want to work on my photo fiber pieces again...and to experiment to find a way to use them more effectively. Ok, and I also got a wide format printer to print them on...

My first experiment started with a photo of two white pelicans that I took below the Keokuk, Iowa dam last year. Since the great flood of '93, white pelicans have been stopping here in the spring and fall as they migrate. I may be slightly obsessed with them.

The photo I cropped and manipulated in Photoshop Elements, and then printed it on cotton organza. It's a very evocative picture, kind of foggy, vague, very low key. I then fused it a piece of multicolored commercial fabric that is mostly greens and violets. Then I started stitching.


Ok, but not quite what I was thinking of. A little too coarse maybe? So I stitched some more.
This is more like it. Maybe it doesn't show up online, but the stitching closer together is more calm looking, more of a flow and not as jarring. But the pelicans aren't quite showing up. So I touched them up with some white pearl Jacquard Luminere paint.


To buy this piece, click here.

I also trimmed the piece and overstitched the edge. As a sketch, it's pretty much done. Can't figure out any way to improve this particular piece. Did I learn anything? Yes, I think I did--subtle can work, a piece can be too low key. Contradictory things? Not really. In person, the piece works better than it does in these scans. But it's still just a sketch. And that's ok, it's the kind of thing I need to do more. I had an art workshop instructor tell me the secret to good painting, which I summarize as 'think, think, think, plan, plan, plan, paint'. Substitute sketch for one of the plan steps, and that's all I am doing. Learning to make art.