Digging into Digital Printing with Wen Redmond

Saturday FIVE went to NH for a workshop with Wen Redmond.   It was a private workshop that Beth negotiated with Wen and was held in her studio at an old mill.  You enter in the green door.

 And then you go up the winding staircase to the third floor.  Her studio has a primo space because it is right by the bathroom and the windows look out over the river.  Beauty and Practicality all wrapped up in one location.

The workshop itself was experimental.  That means we got to play with lots of different types of paper, fabric, and precoats for digital printing.  We came home with lots of samples of what we had learned.  I am only going to show you the fabric ones because that is what I am the most interested in.

 We were told to bring pictures on a flash drive already pre-sized to 4x6 inches or 5x7 inches.  I chose several but as you can see, I printed mostly the picture I took of an Osage Orange grove in Columbus OH. The first two are both fabric collages.  The one of the left is linen/silk organza/linen fabrics with an orange something in the middle of the organza.  The one of the right is a collage of all see through fabrics coated with different types of Inkaid.  Because of the fagility of the fabric, we collaged the fabric onto a sheet of plastic before we coated it with the Inkaid.  After the Inkaid dried, we ran them through the printer to print the picture.  Nothing special was done to the printer in order to print. I really like the picture and really like it printed on the fabric.  I want to do a third one with more orange in the middle and make them a threesome.

 These two pictures are 5x7.  The one on the left is a picture I took at Popham Beach.  It is printed on black fabric that was coated with a white Inkaid.  I could have covered the fabric more completely for a less abstract picture but I like this effect.  The picture on the right (recognize the trees?) is a piece of white fabric that I pre-painted, let dry, coated with Inkaid and then printed.  When the painting is done with an idea of what is to be printed I think the effect would be very powerful.

This last picture is printed on a canvas fabric that comes already prepared for printing.  The white diagonal lines are from a white crayon scribbled on the fabric for a resist.  Again, when used with intent, I think the technique has possibilities.  I did not  bring the photo printed on a piece of fabric treated with molding paste to give it some texture, coated with Inkaid and then printed but, as you can imagine, it has texture.  Cool.

A workshop well worth going to.  I expect to experiment more with the techniques and to incorporate some of them in future projects.  However, if you go to Wen's studio, don't make the mistake I made.  I looked at some of her work.  This piece came home with me.  I am going to float it on a piece of black mat board, frame it, and hang it in my studio for inspiration.

Friday Favorites and a book review

Friday Favorites and a book review

Well, perhaps a an update on my drawing class, a book review, and then Friday Favorites.  
Last week was Spring Break and it was a very good thing because I was behind on my homework.  I finally got caught up with my 2 great masters in my sketchbook, my large copy of a great master, and the large interpretation of a Japanese Wood Block Print.  Last night we started a new technique, chiaroscuro, which I will need to practice before I show it to you but I thought I would show you a couple of pages of my sketchbook.

My instructor commented that she liked the way I had set up my sketchbook.  On the left I have printed instructions and an example (generally found on the internet) of whatever technique we have recently talked about and then on the right hand page I have my attempts at the style.  My goal is to make my sketchbook a reference manual for me to refer back for the different techniques.

Book Review
My friend, Beth, a fellow member of FIVE and an artist on "And Then We Set It On Fire," loaned me her new book, Three-Dimensional Embroidery.  She was right.  I have fallen in love.  I don't care for books that just show pictures of others' work for me to drool on.  I want  instructions. But I don't want instructions to make a purse or a bag or a whatever, I want technique instructions.  This book (!!!) has projects I really want to do.  I want to experiment and play.  I want to stay home from work and stay up at night and work on these projects.  I am giving Beth back her book because I have bought my own.

Friday Favorites
Karen, who was the guest blogger this week at "And Then We Set It On Fire" posted a nice description of her experiments with TAP (Transfer Artist Paper) and Lutrador.  I have both of those products but have not really experimented much with them.  This was a nice reminder to me to get them out again and see what I can do. I think I can incorporate them in my experiments with inks this month.

Crazy (please hear me saying this as K-raaa- z) Mom (momma) Quilts gives a free pattern for a stash buster quilt. The rest of this paragraph is just me being philosophical if you want to skip it.  I struggle with myself over patterns like this.  It is quick, easy, pretty cute, fine for a baby to throw up and poop on quilt.  As an "textile artist" am I too good to make it?  Does all of my work need to be original, inspired, quilt show worthy quilts?  Or is it okay for me to sit down and produce something that takes less creative juice but will probably be appreciated as much (probably more by some people) than an original design.  I don't have the answer but would love to hear yours.

Sharon at Pin Tangle has found Kuler.   "Cooler?" you say.  "Yea, Kuler,"  I say.  It is an adobe application that allows you to choose color schemes.  Check out what Sharon has to say about it and click her embedded tutorial on using it.  Pretty cool.  I tried unsuccessfully to figure out what color wheel it uses --the traditional RYB one or the corrected YMC wheel.  Makes a difference for artists mixing paints or dyes.  Do you know? At any rate, I tried to find my favorite color scheme (orange, purple, and yellow-green) which is a split triad but couldn't get that combination to come up.

This link goes to Wen Redmond's blog rather than to a specific post on the blog.  She took a commission for the Elliot at Rivers Edge in Manchester NH. In 3 or 4 or 5 blogs (I lost count) she takes you step by step from the commission to the finished product.  It is an excellent 1-2-3 tutorial. Thank you, Wen!

Vicki Welsh is a woman after my own heart. She loves experimenting too.  Here are her experiments with Shiva Paint Sticks.

I am sure there are many wonderful blogs that I have missed this week but it is time to publish.  They will have to wait for another week.