Sunny Day Dyeing

Solar Dye Jars with flowers from the garden

In my recent post about natural dyeing I mentioned solar dyeing. This is a really simple and easy technique with highly variable results. Essentially it involves filling a jar with fabric and dye stuffs and leaving it in the sun for a month or more.

My first jar

The rusted iron I added turned the water inky black

I tend to take a very unscientific approach to dyeing generally and solar dyeing lends itself well to this way of thinking as living in Cumbria the solar element is highly variable. I really like the unpredictable element of natural dyeing, I've had mixed results from my solar dye jars but as it's such little effort if I'm not happy with the results I can just stick it in another jar with a different set of leaves or flowers and try again. One of the main attractions is the funny marks and leaf traces that are left on the fabric.

Unwrapping my first solar dye jar

Beautiful patterns on the fabric

I've mostly been using cotton fabrics and silk organza for my experiments as these are the fabrics I use most in my work. The silk takes the colour much more readily than the cotton, even when a mordant is used, so I think my future experiments may involve using different types of silk fabric.

Sorrel leaves sandwiched between cotton and silk

In the jar with more sorrel. The fabric ended up a mink brown colour, much stronger on the silk than the cotton

A selection of jars at different stages

Some of the most successful pieces have been the ones where I've added bits of metal to act as mordants. When iron is used it alters the colour quite dramatically, creating rust tones (not surprisingly) and also lovely grey tones and turning the water an inky black colour. I have a rusty hammer head that I found in the garden that is my favourite thing to add into my jars, it's quite well rusted so gives lovely black tones rather than oranges.

Iron and geranium on silk (left) and cotton (right)

Iron and geranium on silk (left) and cotton (right)

Dock leaves on silk (left) and cotton (right)

I've been using a range of different plant materials to dye with, I love walking round my garden, picking leaves, flowers and twigs and wrapping them in fabric. I should really document what goes into each jar but it's much more fun just leaving it and being surprised by the results!

Studio Arts: Leaf Exhibition

Exhibition View: Collages, prints and handmade paper

Sometime ago I wrote about some of the work I was doing with my Prism Arts group. We were looking at developing various visual arts skills and techniques, using leaves as a starting point. These sessions went really well, with the participants getting stuck into trying new techniques and starting to develop personal visual vocabularies. The sessions worked so well that the group has evolved form being the visual side of our Studio Theatre Company into becoming a separate visual arts group.

Exhibition view

Bunting made from lino prints on fabric

Lino prints on fabric

For me this is a very exciting development because whilst I love theatre my passion really lies in the visual arts. Altering this group to focus on the visual arts allows me to really use my skills and knowledge to enable the participants to develop theirs. The leaf workshops (as I like to call this block of work) showed that this was the best way for the group to develop and expand. We looked at a range of techniques including lino cuts, paper cuts, paper making and weaving. The positive responses from the participants were really encouraging and have also resulted in an impressive body of work.

Collages

Collage and print

Prints

To celebrate this we held an informal exhibition in our main studio space. This allowed us not only to see how much work had been done and to celebrate our achievements but also provided a good opportunity to start developing our critical thinking skills. Having the work up on display (and before that selecting particular pieces to go up on display) makes it easier to talk about what we like and why, what worked well, what didn't work so well and ideas to try out in the future. Having the work in front of us to refer to is very helpful during this process.

Leaf prints on fabric and lino plates

Lino plates

Leaf prints on fabric and handmade paper

I really enjoyed working with the participants to create this work and seeing it displayed in the studio space I felt so proud of what they'd achieved and excited to see how the work will develop. As often happens I was intrigued by how although we all had the same starting point and used the same techniques and materials everybody's work is very different. Our next big 'event' for the visual arts group will be C-Art in September and I'm really looking forward to seeing the work the group produces.

Weaving (done on a peg loom)

Weaving (on a frame)

Weaving (on a frame)

Lovely Leaf and Lino Printing

Leaf Prints hanging in the studio

My Prism Arts Studio Theatre crew and I found ourselves with a few 'odd' weeks; we are still touring 'Raining Trolls and Dragons' and so didn't want to make a start on a new production (as I will get confused) but we wanted to make use of our time. So, I thought this would be a good opportunity to do some skills workshops.

Leaf rubbings

Leaf rubbings

Leaf rubbings

Often we have deadlines to work to so we are not always able to play around with ideas so by doing a series of skills workshops I hope to give the guys a set of techniques they can use next time we come to produce a piece, we will already have a good idea of what might work well.

Printing with leaves

Printing with leaves

Printing with leaves

As we are having such a glorious autumn I thought that leaves would be a good starting point. This gives us something tangible to work with and explore different techniques and will hopefully give the work produced a bit of coherence as I would like us to have a small, informal exhibition at the end of term.

Prints strung across the studio

We started off by going out into Tullie House Gardens (which are right next to our studios) and collecting lots of different leaves. I asked the guys to look for different shapes and textures as well as colours. We gathered an amazing range which was really interesting when we came to use them for printing. Our first activity was to take some rubbings of the leaves. This is an easy and fun activity but can produce very beautiful results. I encouraged people to think about whereabouts on the paper they were doing their rubbings as well as what colours to use.

Lino printing

Colouring the print plate

The next step was to print with the leaves. We used acrylic paint and calico and as before I asked the guys to think not only about colour but also layout and combining different shapes. It was great to see how people approached the printing in different ways and the different results that were achieved. It was also interesting seeing which leaves worked best and watching the group share this information with each other. At the end of the session we hung the prints up to dry and they looked so beautiful strung across the studio.

Lino printing

Print on paper

Building on the leaf printing for the next session we looked at lino cuts. I love the textures and qualities of lino cuts and thought it would be a good opportunity for the guys to develop their work from the previous session. We again began by collecting leaves and then made drawings from the them. These drawings were transferred onto the lino and then carved by myself and the other staff members (lino cutters are sharp and I'm not good with blood!)

Lino printing

A used printing plate

The guys were then able to use their lino cuts to make a series of prints on both paper and fabric. I found it very interesting seeing the different approaches to colour, some people wanted to add layers of colour immediately whilst other people wanted one uniform colour. Both approaches worked well and like last session the range of prints produced was very impressive. It also got me really fired up to do some lino cuts of my own!

A collection of prints

A collection of drawings and prints

Over the next few weeks we will be continuing to explore different techniques including some more printmaking and some paper-making. I think this is a great opportunity to not only develop technical skills but also for the group to have some time to develop more personal ideas and approaches to making work.

A collection of drawings and prints

A collection of drawings and prints

An unknown collaboration...

Finished embroidery

This week I have been finishing off an embroidery started many years ago by a woman I have never met. The piece is a linen table runner (I think, judging by the shape) and from the pattern printed on it I would guess that it was produced in the 1960's or 70's.

How it looked before I started stitching

Detail

The piece has the same design printed on both ends, one of them has just a couple of lines of stitching the other had quite a lot done. This is the section I have completed and the other section I am going to ask one of the participants on Prism Arts Summer School to complete. The piece will then be used as part of the costume for one of the horse puppets we are creating.

Work in progress

Stem stitch stems and thorn stitch leaf

I suppose to some people this may seem like an almost sacrilegious thing to do but I prefer to see it as giving something unfinished, and for a long time unloved, a new life. Using this embroidery in a costume means it will be seen by many more people than if it was left languishing in a linen drawer somewhere, brought out only on special occasions (if at all.) The piece belonged to an elderly relative of another of the Prism Artists and has been in our studio for a couple of years, waiting for someone to come along and finish it and give it a new life. I hope that's what we're doing!

My additions

Her stems, my leaves

Using the stitches already used as a guide I completed the section using mostly stem stitch and in stranded cotton, as that is what had been used already. I've never worked from a pattern printed specifically for embroidery before so it was an interesting technical challenge, following the printed design and trying to blend my stitching with that of the previous embroiderer.

Adding leaves

And flowers

It feels slightly odd to finish off someone else's work, but odd in quite a nice way. I found myself thinking about who she was, what she was thinking as she stitched and how come she never finished it. Did she get bored, or become unable to complete it? I know I have a host of unfinished things in my studio and I wonder if anything were to happen to me would somebody finish them off for me. I hope they would, I don't like the idea of it all packed away and forgotten or thrown out. I wonder would they think about me and wonder what I was thinking?

Completed section

This is one of the things that draws me time and again to stitching and textiles in general, that connection with the past and more importantly that connection with people. We all have such an intimate connection to textiles, a familiarity and understanding that I find fascinating. As Olive Schreiner asked "Has the pen or pencil dipped so deep in the blood of the human race as the needle?" I think maybe not...