The anticipation of unpeeling and revealing the results of the paper dying exploration is magical!
Thanks to all who’ve joined me in these last few days of paper dying.
If you’d like to catch up on the story so far, it started here, went here, went off track awhile here, before showing up here.
It’s taken over my weekend, spilling into the weeks either side, and still there’s stuff soaking and hanging out to dry! But, that all comes later. First of all…..
First batches!
As an aside, before I show you the latest happenings from the paper dying project: I never realised when I embarked on this it would become so all-consuming. I thought maybe a day of tearing, soaking, dripping, swishing, squishing and waiting would be followed up by a few hours of drying, unfolding, oooh-ing n ahhh-ing, then straight on to using and gluing and making.
Nope. Anyways, I’ll explain as I go along.
Having filtered out the papers deemed ‘not quite done’ I was left with a fairly substantial heap of partly-colored insipid stuff to re-dye. In a bid for something different I explored some new techniques.
Putting bits in a jar instead of a tray (done this with fabric, but not paper before)
Using pre-cut-out bits of paper
Using small things to add a bit of pattern. These wire coils were leftover from a previous project…
Ditto with rice (thinking – will absorb moisture as well as leaving rice-shape-patterns)
And again, with buttons
..Bubble wrap…
I haven’t looked at the latest results yet, check back later and find out if any of this worked out!!
Last night I left the marinaded paper ready to sweat by the rad…
Today’s weather has supported my efforts by being quite cold, justifying use of central heating to warm room as well as dry my doings from yesterday.
Carefully unpeeling the layers to get some air flow, I then sorted then into heaps to finish drying and admire
Next stage is sort the ‘finished’ from the ‘not quite there yet‘, iron the former and carry on playing with the latter.
With fabric and textiles, I’m rarely put off by material being the ‘wrong’ color, provided I can dye it. Lately I’ve expanded this reasoning to include paper too. Fortunately for the sake of this project I’d already squirreled away a stock of paper, and the only preparation to be done was some therapeutic tearing and scrumpling.
Some paper (tough brown envelopes, cartridge, wallpaper lining, and watercolor) will tolerate heavy handed roughing up. Tissue, copier, newsprint and (my least fave) sugar paper just don’t have the same endurance, but will survive a lower level of scrunch.
The purpose of this is break up the surface, the scar lines offer a more porous surface for the dye to bleed through, and sometimes give a nice batik-y result.And sometimes they don’t. But we don’t care, we’re just here for shits and giggles.
Let the messy stage commence!
Plastic tray, bit of paper, swish with water, drips of dye & ink.
From here it’s a matter of layering (thinking ‘lasagna’, but without the food elements. Srsly, that would be a whole different result, and not what I’m after here at all)
Thicker acrylic based inks work best thinned right down with water,acrylic acts as an adhesive and if/when used thickly will gum the papers together into an unpickapartable cludge.
Some layers through I like to give the soaking papers a bitova squish with a roller (brayer). The dye will penetrate the paper fibres better, and slop out of the edges of the tray if you’re not careful.
Sometimes I pour off a bit of excess wet into a jar and reuse it further up the ‘lasagna’.
See the batik-y thing going on? Yay!
Onward n upward, paper, water, dye, swish, squish, paper, color, swish, etc
Disclaimer: no books were harmed in this production. Apart from this one. (Second hand and out of date when I got it, 15 year old book on web site building. ) Just saying. Books are my friends, and I never deliberately dismember friends, even in the name of art. Except for the very dead ones.
Some hours later, tray filled, excess juice drained, the soggy lump of color gets tipped out onto something porous (I used a selection of my finest knackered tea towels) and left to dry by the radiator. (If time and climate allow, sunshine will do the trick too)
Oh, n you might wanna be wearing gloves for this. Or, like me, you might only remember this once you have dyed fingers…
Where some people see scrap, I often see ingredients.
Only when it really doesn’t fit with social expectations can I curb my collecting, but I will usually come home with something I didn’t leave the house with earlier in the day.
Leaves, paper scraps, foil and cellophane from sweets, sketches and photos of interesting shapes, patterns and textures; jotted words and phrases from the radio, books, internet or my own head. Findings!
Today I resisted the feathers I saw scattered on the verge as I walked to work. Thinking roadkill, bird-flu, infection, dirt. I saw more feathers, one was 7-8 inches long with a fluffy plumed edge and speckly pattern. Conscious of passing driver’s impression of a grown adult picking up and stashing litter from the roadside. More feathers, smaller but irresistibly velvety. Their owner must have come to an unfortunate end to lose so many clothes. Pheasant? (no corpse), idk.
Thinking aside, when I got to work there was, in my bag, a perfect, elegant, inspirational, new-to-me ingredient.
It wasn’t until I photographed it I discovered it’s a feather and a half!
It might be a subject to draw, a shape to photograph, to inspire. It might act as a brush, then retire to join one of many collages. When the time comes, it will be an ingredient in at least one something I make.
It also looks (to me) like a tiny porcupine with no face.
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