home
about the artist
gallery
blog
links
contact

Archive for March, 2009

Depth of Field Shibori

Tuesday, March 31st, 2009

After finishing today’s pieces, I truly get the title of Jan’s class — Depth of Field Shibori. This piece probably is the best example.

depthoffieldshibori

Here is a detail:

depthshiboridetail

This piece was shibori wrapped and dyed and then underpainted with a gradation of dyes and then shibori wrapped and dyed in a dark dye. Oh, I love this.

Here is more of the work.

This piece was first shibori wrapped and then dyed in bright orange. Today, I rewrapped it and dyed it in violet – yowza!!

orangepurpleshibori

Here is the chopstick piece from yesterday. Today, I wrapped it with chopsticks again and dyed it in chartreuse.chopstickfoldedshibori

The next piece was the one I laid on top of an underdyed fabric while it was still wet and then I smooshed it. Today, I did the rope trick with it. Love it.

ropeshiboriunderdyed

Here is a detail.

ropeshiboridetail

I just had to show Sheila and her mammogram quilt. She used CD clamps for this. Someone said it looked like a mammogram for a dog – LOL.

sheilamammogramquilt

Here is the very talented and lovely Constance Rose, working away, rinsing dyed pieces.

connieatwork

I have more luscious work to show, but it will have to wait for tomorrow. I have to post my window quilt on the 12 X 12 site. Be sure to take a look through our windows.

Shibori Workout

Monday, March 30th, 2009

Over, under, twist and turn. Where do I start? This class is so fabulous. Jan’s work is incredible. She showed us a few pieces today and did a slide show.

janshibori

janshiboricircle

The circle is the leftovers from a series she just made for the Pittsburgh Children’s Hospital. So gorgeous.

First thing this morning, I found out why I purchased a roll of rope from Home Depot. I only needed 4 feet!

ropeshibori

Jan demonstrates wrapping around the rope.

myropeshibori

Here is mine, ready for the dye bath.

applegreenshibori

This one of my shiboris from yesterday. Today I painted a dye gradation over it.

greenshiborioverpainted

The next three pieces were in yesterday’s post. I folded and clamped again to get a more complex surface on each.

diagonalfoldresist

foldclampresist

moreclampresist

The next two pieces were experiments to see the difference between dye painting on dry fabric versus soda ash fabric.  I painted identical gradations. Then they were pole wrapped and dyed in the same dye bath. The top is the dry piece, which Jan prefers – me too. The second piece will be shibori discharged when I get home.

drypaintedshibori

sodaashsoakedpainted

One very valuable thing I have learned in this class is the under and over painting of fabric before and after shibori dyeing. It adds depth and complexity to the surface. Here is my two fer. I have underpainted a gradation and put another piece of fabric on top and spritzed it to get a mottled surface. Yum. These will go on the poles tomorrow.

twoferunderpaintedfabric

This was a teal shibori which I have overpainted in a gradation.

teaclshiborioverpainted

This is a pretty ugly peppermint looking red shibori on the organic cotton. I overpainted this, but don’t have a photo.

reddyeonorganic

This is the rope shibori piece which creates a honeycomb effect.

ropeshiboridyed

And here is the stitched piece dyed in black.

stitchedshiboridyed

This piece was wrapped around several chopsticks with rubberbands and dyed in walnut brown. Tomorrow, it is going into a chartreuse dye bath.

chopstickwrap

Here are a couple of photos of underpainting done by class members

classwork

moreclasswork

And here is a view of the very nice, state of the art, dye studio.

viewofdyestudio

So, I had quite a workout today. It is not easy shoving that fabric down a pvc pipe several times a day — especially when you add string to it.

stringshiborionple

Shibori for Shur

Sunday, March 29th, 2009

The day went by so fast. Reva, my GPS, got us to the Eugene Textile Center, with nary a problem. Getting to Karen’s house tonight was a whole other thing — good thing she wrote down directions for me. Reva wanted me to turn the wrong way on a one way street. Tsk!

I was so busy that I didn’t have time or didn’t remember to take a lot of pictures. Here is Jan Meyers Newberry who is a really organized yet forgiving teacher. You know, she makes suggestions of how to do things, but doesn’t get hung up if you do it another way!!

janpolewrapping

Here she is demonstrating pole wrapping without string – yeah! And how to get those awesome diagonal stripes.

The first thing we did today was to do some folding and clamp resists. For one of them we had to do identical folds and clamp resists except one was with wet fabric and the other was dry so that we can see the difference in how the dye behaves. Here are mine. I used the accordion fold with chopsticks as a resist.

accordianfoldchopstickresist

Mine was not a good example of the difference, as you can see. The one on the left was folded dry. (I think) For my other piece I did the triangle fold with clamped washers as a resist.

trianglewrapwasherresist

I am going to pole wrap this tomorrow or do another clamp resist.Our next project was doing two different pole wrap techniques. No photos beause they had just come out of the washer when we left. Here is Karen concentrating on wrapping hers.

karenconcentrating

I went crazy with some stitching tonight which will go in the dye tomorrow. I started with one circle and then added a curved line and 3 small circles.

shiboristitching

shiboristitchingfinal

I still have to pull up the stitches on the larger circle, but I need to dampen it first.

Karen fixed a comfy meal of meatloaf, baked potatoes and sauted veggies and a salad. It was delicious and appreciated.I got the tour of Karen’s studio in the basement. Wow, she has so much going on down there. And loads of gorgeous fabric waiting for her magic.

I am ready for a good night sleep and looking forward to another creative day. Did I mention that there are 16 people in the class. We have to be VERY organized and well-behaved to give everyone a chance at the dye pots.

I leave you with this gorgeous orchid in Karen’s bathroom.

karenorchid

Pizza with My Peeps

Saturday, March 28th, 2009

Steph’s birthday is on Monday and since I will be down at the Eugene Textile Center up to my elbows in dye, we went out to celebrate tonight. I just want to say that I have the greatest grandchildren. It is such a treat to go out with them. Mia babbles on and on about things and Miles, the quiet one, takes every thing in and analyzes it, very quietly.

We went to Tastebud, which has a wood fired oven.

tastebud

Here are my peeps:

steph

mymile

mymia

Mia has a cold and sounded a bit like Katherine Hepburn!!

The pizza was great. The kids had cheese pizza. The adults had woodfired clams and focaccia, wild mushroom, caramelized onions and Oregonzola cheese and sausage, ricotta and mozzarella.

cheesepizza

mushroompizza

Have I mentioned that pink season is starting in Portland?

pinkseasonstarts

pinkseasonstarts2

My supplies are packed; I’m packed. I am leaving at 7:30 am to get there in time for class. I am really looking forward to 3 days in the dye studio. I will be blogging from Eugene. I get to meet Connie Rose in person and I am staying with Karen Miller — can’t wait to see her studio.

This and That

Friday, March 27th, 2009

I continued ticking of my list. So cathartic, to cross out the things finished. I finished the bamboo hanging rod for Noshi Ribbons.

noshiribbonsbamboorod

I am so blown away by Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Congresswoman from Florida. Did you know that she has had 7 surgeries in the past year and has kept it from her colleagues and the press. She is in her 40s and was diagnosed with breast cancer and they found the gene that indicated she would in all probability have it in the other breast and uterine cancer. She had a double mastectomy and  her uterus removed. I was already impressed with her. She is bright, articulate and a true progressive politician AND she is the mother of 9 year old twins and a 5 year old. After Obama won the nomination, the former Hillary supporter campaigned tirelessly for him, all the while dealing with her medical problems in secret. You go girl. You are my heroine of the moment.