Tag: crafts

From watercolour to tapestry

PiaLinks

And THIS guy, is just friggin awesome:

http://www.worldofthreadsfestival.com/artist_interviews/083_maximo_laura_12.html

I’m getting so many ideas to try out that I never got with knitting, that I think I’m heading in the right direction, and it works so well with other picture making crafts, they kinda weave (haha) together for me. And as I mentioned before, this will make my spinning more fun and less production oriented, since I probably won’t be spinning all my weaving yarns just now, just dyeing them. Win/win on time as well as pleasure.

In fact I’m already in the process of making a small frame loom to make (up to) 15×15 cm test samples of warp spacing/yarn type vs. yarn thickness of the weft as well as samples of various techniques. I figure that should keep me occupied for a while.  And that’s what happens when you spend a Sunday indoors watching youtube because all the farmers decide it’s a good day to spread liquid pig manure on the fields. Gag. Not just a whif on the air this time, but massive sensory overload. I’ll probably have to rewash the laundry on the line…

And something a little different (because I wanted to save the link and my bookmarks are out of control)

http://annakubinyi.blogspot.dk/p/muterem.html

Get your pots and jars ready

PiaPÃ¥ dansk
Corn Marigold / Glebionis segetum / gul okseøje

Soon the plant dyeing season will be upon us, so it’s time to find yarns and get them mordanted (I always do this ahead of time and then just keep the labelled skeins on hand). This year I’ll be working with more natural mordants such as sea water, tannins, soy and rhubarb leaves.

I’m looking for cheap silk yarns and/or fabrics that I can cut into swatches to add to my sample library. As well as cotton.

I’m also going to help myself to some structure by creating a section for it here on the blog with an easy access plant list of which I’ve done and how, update my tags and some other stuff I’ve been thinking about, hoping that it might prove useful for other people as well. I have a few science experiments in mind that might interest you…

I take requests for topics! Who knows, maybe my library contains items I haven’t even thought about mentioning yet. But please be patient, I won’t be finishing this off in a day or two. In fact I’m feeling a bout of blog fatigue coming on, so we’ll see how it goes!

Corn Marigold / Glebionis segetum / gul okseøje
Tussah silk dyed with the flower above (and a few of its friends)

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danishDet er ved at være tid til plantefarvning lige om snart – mon der kommer nye vaidplanter? SÃ¥ det er nu man skal i gang med at samle garn, fÃ¥ det bejset osv. sÃ¥ det er klar hvis man lige skulle fÃ¥ lyst til at smide noget i gryden! I Ã¥r har jeg tænkt mig at lege med naturlige bejser som havvand, rabarberblade, garvesyre og soyamælk i stedet for eller sammen med metalbejserne.

SÃ¥ jeg er pÃ¥ jagt efter bomuld og silke, som garn eller stofrester jeg kan bruge til at lave prøver med. Gerne billigt…

For at hjælpe mig selv til at holde struktur på tingene, og måske være en hjælp til andre, går jeg i gang med at udvide plantefarvningssektionen her på bloggen med lister, opskrifter, links, tips og andet. Jeg tager også imod forslag til emner, måske ved jeg noget, som jeg bare ikke har tænkt på at skrive om endnu?

Og jeg vil gøre mit bedste for at også opdatere det hele på dansk. Det kommer nok lidt i bidder hen ad vejen, så kig forbi i ny og næ.

Got a light?

PiaChit Chat

eclipse

What do you use for studio/work light, when daylight isn’t enough?

It’s not that it matters greatly, if I put my mind in “flexible” I can knit, spin, read, doodle, play work play on the computer and one day, when perhaps the outside gets more comfortable, work in the garden or ride horses. But still, I find myself some days wishing I could paint when I had planned to do so.

I’m really finicky with lighting temperatures. Not too cold and blue and definitely not your typical cosy yellow everyday lamps. It’s especially bad now with the new energy saving bulbs, which are of course a good thing, just not for colourwork.

Over the window of my office I have a “biolux” fluorescent tube which emulates daylight, I use it in winter to make days longer and brighter, and it’s not directly made for artwork, but it’s not bad. 36W/6500 K (I think it’s this one). The thing is, my office is not big enough for painting, especially since my cats are determined to share the table. Also when it rains, best place to shake your muddy paws, drop by for a bit of love and perhaps a dry lap for transferring moisture before they head back out. And any obstacles are to be climbed on, basically.  Right behind me on the floor 1 large dog for tripping over (used to be 2). I have no door…. See where that’s going?

So, obviously a 120 cm tube like that with a standard, open fixture isn’t very pretty in the middle of a living room ceiling, although it might help a bit. So, do I care? Does anyone have better suggestions? Or do you just work in the dark/good weather?

Golden Open

PiaPainting

Yesterday I decided to play with my small test tubes of the new(ish?) Golden Open acrylics. Yes, play 😉 and picking some new to me colours as well, india yellow and sap green, with white and ultramarine. I’ve been feeling that I sometimes want to get away from the very bright carnival colours without going brown and grey, you know?

The Open series are supposed to dry slower than regular acrylic paint, but without the smell of the oil and turpentine. As well as staying wet on the palette even overnight.

And they do take their time drying. But it seems that they get sticky with the brush just as fast as the others, or nearly so, and then just stay that way – forever. In fact one canvas done with medium is still slightly sticky this morning. What I was looking to get was a fairly long blending time on the canvas with no brush tracks. Copious amounts of medium helped a bit, but also worked as a glaze. I did a couple of washes with and one “abstract” background without. Just randonly picking up paint, apply, pick up more and try to blend the two areas.

rubbish

So I wondered if anyone out there had another or the same experience? I don’t mind the longer waiting time as long as I get the longer working time, but one without the other seems pointless. Or is it the no skinning and palette useability that is the actual deal? The pamphlet says “can be reconstituted for a period of time (an hour) once set, using water, fresh paint or mediums.”

I’m looking for something to replace my W&N Galeria when they run out or get to sluggish and it seems Golden is all the rage these days. I already have a hard time squeezing them out of the bottles compared to the couple of newer tubes I have, and thought perhaps that’s why I was experiencing stickyness. The sample Golden Fluids I have do the same though.

Maybe I’m just working too big a surface. (50×50 cm in this case) Doodling away in one small corner works very well if you have your painting all planned, but not if you’re just going to wave your arms a bit and see what happens. Remember, I’m trying to learn to be intuitive about it. Absolutely almost non-thinking. Sometimes I think you have to visit all the extremes to find your middle ground?

So today I’ll try fewer colours in the first round wave, when it begins to get sticky I’ll go at it with fresh paint and water (I thought I was doing that yesterday, but….) Maybe I use too thin layers. Will have to test a thick coat in one corner. (having only those very small tubes)

Dye plans 2013

PiaPÃ¥ dansk

Well, after ranting about to-do lists, I guess I should be cautious about setting things in stone, but of course I’ve had some thoughts about what I wanted to do this year.

I’m fed up with just sampling, although I haven’t tried all there is to try. So I’d really like to dye larger quantities to actually use for (knitted) projects, I have tonnes of dried dyestuff and more likely to happen with my garden plans implemented (time to order seeds!). This means I have to spin A LOT of generic yarn or find a nicer yarn base to order in bulk, that I can whip out for a sweater dye project or whatever, whenever. Which requires some $£€! so I’m holding my horses, but also feeling I need to do something or I’ll be stuck not dyeing at all. I want NICE stuff, not just whatever random skeins I can find in a supermarket. My current yarn base for plant dyeing is fine, but I wouldn’t wear it, you know?

So apart from my plant to-try list, producing and collecting dye material, my goal is to figure out WHAT I want to use my plant dyeing for. Knitting, felted items, fiber “paintings” or just sell the surplus? Leave it on a shelf in the “Collected skills” box?

hhock01

During the meanwhile, I have a hollyhock test project on the stove for y’all, coming real soon.

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Plantefarveplaner for 2013

Jeg har spekuleret lidt over, hvad jeg egentlig vil med min plantefarvning, det har været sjovt, men det bliver ogsÃ¥ lidt kedeligt at bare producere testgarn og eksperimentere. PÃ¥ den anden side har jeg ikke nogen reelle projekter sÃ¥dan lige planlagt, som jeg kan sætte i gang. Enten skal jeg finde nogen gode strikkegarner og købe et kæmpe lager jeg lige kan trække en sweaterfuld ud af ved lyst og behov til farvning, jeg kan spinde og spinde og spinde hvidt og bygge et lager, jeg kan sælge det jeg producerer. Eller skal jeg gÃ¥ i gang med at filte og billedvæve, hvor jeg kan bruge de smÃ¥ testfed til noget reelt? Jeg kunne ogsÃ¥ bare lægge det pÃ¥ hylden og føje det til listen over “Ting jeg kan”.

Så mit største mål i år er ikke kun at få sået lidt flere farveplanter (noget skal der jo alligevel gro i haven), men også finde ud af, hvad jeg egentlig kan bruge det til. Der er jo kun et begrænset antal timer i døgnet til kreative projekter, som jeg til gengæld har nok af!