After a monumental dry spell and a couple false starts, I am suddenly re-energized and working once again on textiles. Two variations in my old routine have really got me excited. I told you a couple of posts ago about the two new fabrics I was auditioning...well the winner is the linen silk combo. Its more expensive, narrower, and lighter weight, but the way it takes color reminds me again of why I do this in the first place. Also, it releases wax much more easily than any other fabric I have worked with (probably a function of that light weight). I can actually contemplate removing and rewaxing, should a design call for that, when before it was just too hard to even consider it.
Another change is going from squares to runners. I still love squares, but I'm just not coming up with good new designs and I am tired of my old patterns. I also need to increase my output to get more practise and improve my techniques. I switched from 50" squares to 15" x 70" runners, and now have cut that down to 15" x 50". ( The 45" width of my new fabric encouraged this also.) Long and skinny suddenly opened previously unworkable design possibilities and my interest and enthusiasm zoomed upwards. Yippee!
One new design has come from a small metal piece made by my jeweler friend Lois Bertolino. She came into work one day last fall and showed me a flat disc of metal she had etched with a pattern she had originally made by tie-dyeing fabric. (Talk about full circles.) I was just captivated with it and got her permission to make a rubbing. The little graphite circles in the picture are what I used to make the silk screen above them. Screening the image with both dyes and discharges is how I made the runner shown.
I love a lot of what is going on in the circles, but my control over their placement needs work. I took too cavalier an attitude about getting the silk screen down on the right spot ( it's just a straight march down the fabric, how hard can it be?) so the circles aren't spaced well. I thought I wouldn't mind if they were a little off, but I do. I will be making more.