goodies in my e-mail

I was happy the other day to get a few jpgs from my dear friend Marlene Cohen of work she has finished. My goodness, she has been busy -- no wonder she's been so quiet.There were five pieces altogether - two of them made with fabrics I had printed, given to her, and forgotten about. I am not posting those at the moment. Marlene is from London -- much too far for my taste. If we are lucky, we see each other every couple of years. I have a quilt going to Birmingham this year, but I will not be going with it.

At any rate, I always find her work expressive and filled with layers of meaning. This one, with its juxtaposition of pastel and acid colors and its graceful, but sharp-edged shapes, speaks to me of strong and conflicting emotions. Here are two more -- entirely different from the one at the left - either a diptych or the beginning of a series.

On another subject... I finally attacked the reconstituted gelatin plate I showed you the other day. Here it is before I printed with it. It had the good grace to fall apart as I was removing it from its pan. Made my life easier. And here is a piece of fabric I printed, inspired by looking at my own fabric in the quilt of Marlene's which I will post at some point. It will look good when it is cut up into bits. I will leave the cutting-up-into-bits for tomorrow after I get what I hope will be a decent night's sleep.

if it's 2:pm it must be break time

This is getting to be a habit. I remember when I used to WORK for a living (my mother's definition of work is leaving the house every day, going to an office, having a boss, and getting paid regularly). Been there/done that. I was the Director of Promotion for a computer trade magazine for 7 years and then (I'll leave out the good parts) fast forward...for the last 10 of my years as an employee, I marketed and delivered career transition counseling services to to corporations for their EX-employees .

I couldn't sit at a desk for more than 45 minutes when I was up, roaming around and taking a coffee break. Being an artist means always being up and around - and mostly, I need to sit down to take a coffee break. Today, in addition to the coffee, I did two experiments.

Experiment #1

Taste test. Two chunks of bittersweet from Whole Foods. One, Caro chocolate from Spain, the second is Valharona 70% cocoa. I tasted a teensy bit of each and couldn't tell which I liked better so I will force myself to have a little more. I think the Valharona is less sweet, which is good. It is also more expensive, which is bad. Whole Foods has several kinds of chocolate and I shall have to try them all. But not today. Nevertheless, the caffeine from both the coffee and chocolate has helped wake me up a bit.

Experiment #2

Chemistry test. If you've been reading my blog for a while you may remember this. http://studio78notes.blogspot.com/2006/12/thiox-and-stuff.html.

Redux. I made a gelatin plate about 2 wks ago and never had time to use it. Found this in the fridge today, but decided to try a "what if?" on it and see if it would reconstitute. Poured boiling water on it and then put it in the microwave and kept smushing that thing around as it got soft. Finally, most of it was melted and I put the pan back in the fridge. One hour later - smooth as glass, except for where the blob that didn't melt is sticking up through the surface and where the leaf from the asparagus fern I was watering at the time is embedded. But, aha! Success! Perhaps I shall do more gelatin printing over the weekend

gelatin prints

These seem to be the topic on a number of discussion lists this week. While I was ironing fabric tonight to clear my head and organize the random stuff lying around, I came across quite a few gelatin printed pieces of fabric. Here are some that I might ever do something with.

In this last one, coming up, the gelatin print is the background. I wasn't happy with it so I screened some images on top. This is only one area of the fabric; there are other background textures and other images elsewhere on the cloth. That's all for tonight. I'll try to be better about posting; I'm just waiting for some interesting adventures to occur so I have something to write about. Ho hum.

more on gelatin, etc

Last night, I decided to cut my gelatin plate into shapes. But before I got too far, it decided to break apart all by itself. So much for having control over your art! During the week in the fridge, it had developed pock marks -- added texture that made it even more interesting to work with. Kinda cool, huh?

Here is the ugly piece of fabric I decided I needed to put another layer on. I had batik'd it and was underwhelmed with the results.

This is what it looks like now that I've introduced it to gelatin printing.

Right now it is on my design wall, looking like this.

We'll see what it says to me tomorrow morning.

Thiox and stuff

Animal, vegetable, or mineral??

While you are pondering the answer, here are some things about Thiox...

1. Its real name is Thiourea Dioxide and it is a color removing agent.
2. I buy mine from ProChem and there are directions on the jar. No doubt, Dharma sells it also.
3. It does not destroy fabric so you do not need to treat it afterwards.
4. Unlike bleach, it is safe to use on silk.
5. It is activated by moist heat and does not smell till you steam it.
6. When you steam iron it or boil it (thiox bath), it smells rather vile so you will want to wear a respirator and/ or do it near an open window or outside.
7. It smells similar to discharge paste but is chemically different and may discharge differently.
8. Not everything discharges with Thiox. Some things only discharge with bleach.
9. Bleach and Thiox will discharge the same fabric to different colors.
10. If you steam iron the fabric, you can control how much discharge you have.

I boiled those shirts and fabrics from yesterday in a discharge bath, but most often I use it the way I use discharge paste.

I'm sure you'll have some excellent guesses as to what the picture above is. I will check back tomorrow.

gelatin and more

I have finally had a chance to mess up my print studio again by spending some time there. I haven't played with gelatin for a while, except for when I am teaching it, so I thought I would work with it for a change. Here is my gelatin plate after a long afternoon of printing. Actually, the plate is more interesting than the fabric, but I did get a few results I am happy with.

I won't show you the picture of what a plate looked like after I forgot to put it away in the fridge and it sat on my table for a couple of days. Eeeewww. This one, however, is going strong and seems indestructible. Just when I am eager for it to break apart, it refuses to budge. I'll just keep working till it self-destructs (or till I do). In the meantime, I'll just keep playing
and see what happens. I did this next one with strips of paper randomly arranged on the plate.

This piece was randomly printed with some found objects. It needs another layer. But doesn't everything?
Then, tonight I went back to the process I have been playing with and overprinted on some ugly fabric. A definite improvement - believe me! And the fabric is not even dry yet.

It felt good to get back into the print studio. Tomorrow morning I have to finish my gift shopping and then, hopefully, I can go back and do more work. I have so much fabric sitting around that it is insane to be printing more. But that's the way it goes.