Disintegration II

Last night I finished this dyed, painted, silk screened, foiled and embroidered cloth that ended up being 13x9" when completed. I am more pleased with it than not - although I am my own worse critic and not a great judge of my own work. I would love to be in a small supportive circle of fellow artists who are able to establish enough support & trust (important, that trust thing) among themselves to view each other's work and comment on what works, what doesn't, etc. Does anyone out there have experience with a group of this sort? How well does it work? Is it beneficial?

Work in Progress

Another 4x6’er in the works. The photo isn’t the greatest but you get the idea. This is painted & inked hand dyed fabric with foiling and hand embroidery added. It will also have embellished fabric rods attached – maybe with some of those tres cool, vintage, clear sequins I found.

You know, I wish there were a huge demand for 4x6 textile art. For some reason these measurements & I get along really well. I could make this little gem size all day long. But I know that in order to reach my art goals I need to start working bigger more often. I don’t think I’ll ever produce really large work but geez…I might need to at least get into the double digits!

Lots of Shimmer

Building on the cairns theme more....except now it's become more about a feeling of ancient decoration on stones and building structures than just the stones themselves. If you click on the photo it will open a window and show it much larger - then you'll get an idea of all the textures and sparkle. This piece uses hand dyed silks (cottons wish & dream they could take dyes as well as silk!), painted and distressed sheer fabric, a vintage jewelry finding that I altered, beads and vintage sequins. It's a 4x6er and is my current favorite.

Sunday Afternoon

Kathy asked in a previous comment how this was made. It is sheer fabric attached to a frame then matte medium was applied to both the front and back. When that dried I went to work with acrylic paints, dynaflow, rubbing alcohol and water. Then I created folds that I stitched together. Now the free motion quilting is progressing with more to be done. This is very sensuous when seen in person. I think I will try to create more of these pieces and submit them to a gallery for their consideration. I doubt they'll have anything similiar.

Bliss

My great artist friend Fran http://francesca-burras.blogspot.com/ inspired me to try working with Lutrador after seeing what she did with it yesterday. Now...Fran is an amazingly versatile artist who works in many different mediums and is so good at all of them we ask her how she can stand herself and her many talents.

Anyway, the top photo is Lutrador that was painted and then had a photo transfer applied. The final step was a burning with the soldering iron. I think I'm going to add some copper foiling and stitch it onto some of my home dyed fabric OR attach it to the bottom piece. This piece is sheer fabric that had gel medium applied to it. After the gel dried I painted it with fabric dyes and acrylics then sprayed it with plenty of alcohol to get those cool textured effects alcohol renders. The image was then transfered onto the whole shabang.

Life is very good this early Sunday morning!

Oh The Places We Go!

For months now I have been fiddling around with paint and dyes on fabric, trying this and that with mixed results. The main issue I've been working to resolve is to get a truly texturized, layered effect painted surface on fabric that is not stiff and has an ethereal look. Last night I realized a bit of success with a new technique. I took polyester sheer curtain fabric, stretched it over a frame and then coated it with gel medium on both the front and back. When the medium dried it provided a barrier for the paint but retained a flexible surface on the cloth - even after layers and layers of paint were applied, manipulated with rubbing alcohol, rubbed, layered, etc. The depth of this piece is not captured by this photo. More layers and experimentation to come!

The Passion Continues

This piece of cloth has been dye painted, discharged, dyed again, painted and probably a thing or two that I forgot I did. I'm seeing a floral motif emerging with vines and leaves. I also have a silk screen prepared with an impression of window panes....."looking out on the garden" is my working title right now....of course all of this is subject to change since the best plan when it comes to organic abstracts is to allow them to morph and evolve naturally....and keep the human control factor at bay as much as possible.

Purple Trees

I finished this today and I'm happy with how lush it looks. In fact, I'm so happy with it I decided to post it on Ebay. The focal quilted piece is attached to a painter's canvas that has been wrapped in a gorgeous purple fabric. The trees were done with my own hand carved stamps and acrylic paints. This piece has summer written all over it!