Play Day With Scarlet

An artist friend of mine from Evansville wanted to come  have a play day with me this week.  So we decided to make paper cloth.  Scarlet had not done that before and I had purchased some new tissue paper that I wanted to experiment with.  We had a blast, of course.

This time, instead of just layering random pieces of paper, which would in the end, be covered with a layer of paint and stitch, I chose to make some that were deliberate and thoughtful, of color scheme and contrast in size and patterns.  These really did not need paint when they were finished.  The only thing I did to them was dry brush some Lumiere metallic paints on them which was caught by the high relief wrinkles from the tissue paper.  And that was enough.  I love them just as they are.

I’m very pleased with the outcome of both of these smaller pieces.  They would make great journal covers, but would have to be mixed with other cloth because of their size.  Since I scanned them into the computer, I have digital files…and cotton inkjet sheets to print on!  I printed them out on cotton and made small journal covers.  I also used a TAP transfer to jazz the covers up a bit.

Some of them have black linings with a black strap and some have brown linings with a brown strap.

If you want to learn how to make paper cloth, there is a tutorial on my sidebar that will give you all the directions for making it.  Just scroll down to the Tutorials section.

Sketching And Gouache

I recently participated (somewhat) in an online journalling class with Roz Stendahl.  It was sponsored by Strathmore.  See Roz’ blog here.  She encouraged me to sketch in this workshop, even though I’m not a big sketcher of real items.  I’m more of a…doodler.  I do appreciate seeing someone else’s work of sketching and the fact that Roz painted her sketches was interesting.  But for me to do it…not so much.

I was out mowing the yard on Monday when I saw dried seed pods on our Golden Raintree trees.  I knew I had to grab that twig with pods and sketch it.  There was something so simple about it…and it was old, from last years pods, and dried out.

I did sketch it, then yesterday I decided to paint the page with gouache, which is a watercolor paint that Roz highly recommends.  I purchased some specifically to try it out.  I sort of like the process.  I don’t know that this will make me become an avid sketcher, but I’m warming to it.  Roz would be so proud.  (And I have enough gouache to last me to my nineties.  I only ordered 3 tubes, but the amount of paint this took is so minimal.)

Pods

I’m even thinking of adding some photo transfer to this page.  The Golden Raintree trees are now in bloom, preparing to launch their thousands of new seed pods.  I took photos yesterday.

Other Odds and Ends

I  have been working on tote bags using cloth I make.

And while I love the fabrics and the looks of this one and another one I made from discharged black cotton, the price may be prohibitive for some.  I wanted to find a way to make something with a lower price tag.  Sooooo….I purchased some canvas tote bags (yeah, I know I’m cheating a bit) and created pockets for them from my cloth.  I always like having an outside pocket on whatever I’m carrying so I can throw my keys in there and keep them within easy reach. I thought others might too.

New Series in Paper

Last week I was working on getting some things ready to sell.  I often do events in New Harmony, IN  and have a lot of photographs from that historic tourist town.  I decided to start a series of collages from photographs that might be appealing to visitors to the area.

Stories of New Harmony:  Brick, log cabins mixed with modernity.

Stories of New Harmony #1
Stories of New Harmony #2
Stories of New Harmony #3
Stories of New Harmony #4
Stories of New Harmony #5
Stories of New Harmony #6
Stories of New Harmony #7