Serigraph Monotypes

.. or breakdown printing, if you prefer! My friend Robyn wanted to have a try, so we spent a day playing with dyes and screens at Easter.

This one was a fragment of a cloth we used as a tablecloth under various messy activities at Fibrecircle last year. It began life as off-white quilters' muslin. This part of the tablecloth looked pretty boring, so, before we cut it apart to share, I threw it in the waste dye bucket after an earlier printing session, which turned it pale blue.

Here's how it looks after printing:

It just looks like a tree, in full autumn splendour, with traces of a house behind it. I'd love to pretend that this was an effect I achieved with planning and purpose, but it's basically serendipity! I think it just needs a little painting and maybe some stitch now, don't you?

I have a real problem with acquiring or making samples. I'm trying hard to use them up but I currently have nearly 200 pieces of cloth, of various sizes, all painted, printed or block printed, often more than once. If I use ten a year, that's 20 years' supply! Friends have suggested it's time to weed out my sample folders and toss ones that I can't see myself using. But I hate to do that, not because I'm unable to throw useless things away! Here's why:

This is one of my paint cleanup rags. It was first photographed for my files in mid 2010, which was probably when it first had some colour added to it. I made a patchwork cushion for the Kambra Challenge, with fabric I block printed and I think I used up the leftover colour on this piece of cloth. It was used as a brush-wiper a few times. Then I grabbed it to wipe off a Shiva paintstik and I ended up with blobs of paintstik in the middle. Not very exciting, is it?

Ever the optimist, I drew lines on it with black pen, which made it look a bit more interesting. But it still had that awkward blob of paintstik right in the middle, which was thick and ugly and would not peel off. I thought of tossing it again then, but it just didn't happen.

Then a month or so ago, I was looking for something to use as the basis of a postcard. I realised I could cut six, 6in x 4in postcards from this cloth, and still miss most of the chunky stuff.

The postcards looked pretty boring, when cut apart, so I started painting. I laid down a transparent wash of colour on all of them, using Setacolor paints - some yellow, some green, some blue, just to unify what was there and see what emerged. Then I began to build up layers, mostly with transparent paint but some small areas of opaques. Here's the first one in progress:

I finished it in time to swap with the Fibrecircle girls last meeting.

It's very stylised but I quite like the way it's turned out. I have a couple more in the works from the same piece of fabric, also forest-themed ones.

Now see, if I'd tossed that fabric as useless, I wouldn't have made those postcards. What's a girl to do?

Time for an update

Remember that paint rag I talked about here? And a couple of other times - look under Flowerpot. I've done some more painting on it a few times since it last appeared here, and it's fast approaching the time when I'm ready to add some stitch. You may know I'm a bit obsessive about process, and I record the growth of pretty much anything I make (bigger than an ATC!). So it occurred to me to go back and look at how things started. I got a huge surprise, and I think you might too. Here's the very first, from April 2007, and the most recent (last week) photos.


I'm pretty sure photo 1 might have already had some deliberate painting on it by the time I photographed it. I'd already roughed in the pot shape and added the splodgy background for the brick wall. I'm more rigorous now about photographing likely paint rags at the beginning, but this was the very first one that I ever decided to make into a specific work, instead of just being used when I needed a certain colour fabric. From my notes, the original had the coloured splodges, when I'd wiped my brushes, and a pale apricot background, when I'd used it to clean off a palette.
Where now? I think it needs a lot more greenery, so that will probably happen next time I have the paints out. And I need to add some more shadows to some of the flowers, and maybe add a touch of orange-pink to the yellow roses.
(Sorry to those people who liked the pot left undefined. I let it sit for a long time but I just didn't like it. Guess you'll have to paint your own now! See how easy it is?)

Flowerpot

While I was painting yesterday, I managed to put a little more detail on this paint rag. The Love-in-a-Mist flowers are suitably spiky now and I added shadows to some of the flowers and the pot. It's really starting to look like I imagined! I think I might need to give this piece a bit more sustained attention, instead of just adding a bit when I have the appropriate colours mixed.

Paint Rags - Flowerpot

Remember this from a couple of days ago? When I was painting yesterday, I had just the right colours on my mixing sticks to add some more flowers to this piece. One of the colours I had mixed was just right to add shape to the flowerpot. It's really starting to come together now, isn't it? Pretty exciting for something that started life as a paint rag!

Paint Rags - Flowerpot

I've had two very productive days, but sadly, none of it was making art! I'm very hopeful of getting into the workroom for some productive time tomorrow. It's Anzac Day, a public holiday here in Australia, when we honour those who have fallen in war. The returned soldiers will march in the city, and afterwards probably get drunk and play two-up. It's the only day in the year when this gambling game is permitted.

Since I have no progress to show on current works, I thought I'd share one of my paint rags. A couple of years ago, I realised that the rags I use to clean up after painting were often as interesting as the fabric I was painting. So I started using better quality fabric, first homespun and now quilter's muslin, for the cleanup and to use up leftover paint. I now have a collection of very interesting painted fabrics to use as a basis for stitch.



This one will probably be worked on first. The splodges of colour reminded me of flowers, so the last time I painted, I used up leftover paint to add shadows on what will be a pot, and to add a random brickwork pattern behind the shapes. I have no plans to work on this any time soon, though!