Transparents

We have been working with Christine on the next online Studio 11 workshop, this time looking at transparent fabrics and how to get colour onto them. Christine has uploaded several tutorials and we all meet via Zoom once a week for updates and discussions. In the absence of a real one, I am improvising a "design wall" by pinning bits together and suspending them from a picture in the sitting room, hence the ghostly radiator! Tis way I can get some idea of how the colours are, or are not visible from a distance.

The first section here are all coloured using transfer inks, which have a gloopy consistency. Once painted onto a paper support of some sort they can then be ironed onto synthetic fibres, here sheer polyester voile. These were my first attempts, just playing with the colours to see how they came out. Some of them will get another layer, investigating how the colours mix when layered onto the fabric. Some of the patterns were painted directly onto the paper, some are monoprints. I have painted a few more papers since, which are awaiting my next slow ironing session. You do have to move the hot iron very very veery slowly. Appropriate music helps -  ranging from Faure's Requiem to Leonard Cohen. I have eclectic tastes

Then I played with walnut ink and Quink, and acrylic inks, scrumpling the fabric into a plastic pot of appropriate size and allowing the thing to "mulch" for a bit before taking it out and allowing to dry. The textures are really interesting, even more so when the fabric is layered over itself. At the bottom I have layered a piece from each technique, hence the colour ghosting behind the dark fabric. The acrylic ink gives a slight stiffness to the voile, but that might be because I've not washed the fabric yet - a vigorous rinse in cold water to get the excess pigment out. I have given it a hot press to set/cure the inks. 

More walnut ink experiments, this time smoothed over a piece of plastic wetted with ink. The fabric was then pushed about so it bubbled up in places, the colour pools around the ripples in the fabric. I really like this, but it is very subtle, I need to experiment more.

And the same technique with acrylic inks, which cure and will stay on the fabric, unlike the walnut ink which is likely to wash out. They looked incredibly vibrant when still wet and on the plastic, more subdued once dry but I think I like that better

The more neutral colours have potential for my Mesopotamia theme and I have been working towards appropriate textures in my experiments. They might provide an interesting base for some paper lamination, which is the next technique to work with. 

I have such admiration for Christine for keeping Studio 11 going despite the difficulties of the past year, not just Covid, but her loss of her previous Studio and consequent stress and upheval. Our little creative community is still thriving under her generous tutelage, and lockdown has become the catalyst for her developing a series of online courses which can now be found on her website. 

We are very lucky.