Botanica Exhibit

This month I'll be showing my own work in the Pink House Gallery, all on the botanical theme, with an opening on Friday, June 3rd from 5 to 7 pm. I've been enjoying using plants as partners in my art making for several months and it will be fun to hang some of that experimentation on the walls. Below are a few examples of both finished works and of those in progress. For more information, see my page "In the Pink House Gallery." I'll have quite few new fun gifts this summer too. I hope you can check it out.

"Findings - Live Oak Leaves" - leaves embroidered on paper with watercolor

"Beech Leaves" - deconstructed screen print on paper

"April Remains I" - screen print on fabric

"Purple Grape Iris" collage - fabric and thread

Continuing with Botanical Topics - Solar Printing

Two prints on linen with "Black" SolarFast paint. The fabric was light rosy pink to start.

 I've just finished writing the April posts for the very cool blog "... and Then We Set It on Fire", where I wrote about using plants as both medium and subject matter in surface design work. I am mainly designing on fabric but works on paper show up as well. I wasn't able to post about my entire list of topics on the Fire blog, so I'll do it here.

One of the topics on my list was sun printing. I've done some of that with Setacolor paints, with good success and I am going to experiment with that again. But Robbie, of the blog "Robbie's Paw Prints", and I had a short online chat about her experience with SolarFast paints as one way to solar print on fabric with plants (and other materials). (Thanks, Robbie!)

Fern photo edited and converted to a negative on my computer (l) and the negative printing on Solarfast transparency film (r).

SolarFast paint and cotton fabric laid out on a foamcore sheet.

Spreading SolarFast paint on the fabric in a dim corner of my studio. This is supposed be the "Avocado" color.

Transparency negative immediately laid over the painted fabric, covered with plexiglass to keep it flat. I placed it in a sunny window.

Finished fabric, with transparency removed after 40 minutes. Still doesn't look like "Avocado" to me, but I like it.

This was a very easy process. A few things learned:

• the less intense the sunlight, the longer the material needs to be left to develop. (Five p.m. is rather late this time of year.)
• the colors of the SolarFast paint don't quite do what is expected. Be open to that.
• although I correctly placed my printed film ink-side up (it was the darker side on my film) to avoid dissolving the ink onto the fabric when developing, I left the plexiglass on it for awhile and some evaporative moisture on it caused a small amount of ink to come off on an edge of the film.
• the feel of the printed fabric is about the same as the original fabric. Can't wait to stitch on it!