Mo Orkiszewski from Sydney Australia (itscrowtime.wordpress.com) sent me a pennant cut from an old wedding gown. She plans to use it, and over forty others, in an art installation next year. The theme of the piece is "I Dream of a World Where Love is the Answer". I was so surprised and pleased to be included in her work, which is routinely beautiful.
So, what to do? I started by carrying my scrap around, fingering it. The dense satin feels so good to touch. (It reminds me of the heavy ribbon binding on one of my childhood blankets. I fell asleep every night rubbing my fingers over the wrinkles....a purely tactile pleasure.) However, I couldn't tell what the fabric was made of and that matters a lot to my usual ways of working. Mo described the wedding dress as vintage...over sixty years old. That works out to 1957, which is before polyester took over the world, but maybe "sixty" was just a ballpark thing and I need natural fibers for my natural dyes. Determining the fiber content of mystery fabric can supposedly be done by burning it and examining the ash, so I cut off a little bit off the bottom and set it on fire. The ash was black and crumbly, not melted beads of plastic, so I think it is natural, not synthetic, but I couldn't tell what kind of natural.
I was at least encouraged to go ahead with plans for waxing and dyeing with natural dyes. I had been thinking of what images to use and suddenly came up with this cartoon. I'm still not sure if I will be able to wax this accurately, or if the dyes will take well. but as of this moment, this is my dream of a world where love is the answer. Yeah, I know....literally.