Friday, October 27, 2006

Liberated!


Here are my paints and brushes, liberated from their packing boxes. So too are the rest of the art cart supplies, neatly back in their place. I can hear Margaret now: "So where are the pictures of your leaf prints?" Patience, please. The boxes were sitting in an unheated room and everything felt quite cold when pulled out. I thought it best to let things warm up to room temperature (although I could find nothing on the bottles or catalogs to confirm this). Oh, and it was pretty late in the day when I got to this, and I wanted a bit more time to set up and play. Tomorrow afternoon looks promising.

I again got a chuckle wondering what my movers thought of the items on the art cart (they'd asked what they should label the boxes, so it wasn't obvious to them). The cart corrals the odds and ends needed for dyeing, painting and stamping, including yogurt and frosting containers (for mixing dyes and paints), measuring spoons and cups, whisks & funnels, dishpans & rubber gloves, a dust mask, aluminum baking pans & combs (for marbling), various size jars (including 2 doz 1/2 pt canning jars in their original boxes), a blender and an empty wine bottle (to use like a brayer). This is art?

Those 1/2 pt canning jars, by the way, are from my first try at dyeing fabric. The idea came from a magazine article, and I see that the author has finally put this method into book form. I think this is it if you're interested. Her instructions give you a color wheel of fabrics with options to dye up pastels (using less dye) or a darker run. First time out I went with the medium value run using the usual turquoise/fuschia/yellow dyes. I always wanted to dye up the lighter and darker sets, plus sets using different yellow/blue/red dyes. Unpacking those jars reminded me of this, and now that I could dye again, I really should get the supplies and give it a go. I'm particularly lacking good pastels, so I think I could justify dyeing up at least that batch. But first...leaf printing!

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