Wednesday 20 June 2012

Today's the Day

Well, it was going to be the day I worked on my quilt for Festival of Quilts but as the sun was shining I got side-tracked, as you do.  All that sunshine was an open invitation to do some sunprinting.  I had collected some gingko leaves while we were away last week (Oh yes!  We've been away.......again!) and sunprinting seemed ideal for a play.


I started out by preparing my surfaces, as in laid my fabric onto boards covered with waxed paper.


A good assortment of silk paints and a spray bottle of water to soak the fabrics with.  My initial inspiration was the leaves but I soon had lots of other ideas to play with. ( I also inadvertantly threw half the bottle of grey onto the floor and all over my chair!)


I spray soaked each fabric and then dripped the silk paints on and re-sprayed to spread the colour a bit more.  I decided to sprinkle sea salt on each piece too.


I used coffee stirrers, cotton reels and bottle bungs for this one to offset round shapes against straight lines.


Next, an assortment of keys,


Dried leaves and grasses from the garden,


and finally, the gingko leaves with a selectionof leaves and fern.  The very fine stem is Fennel and it gave a lovely scent.

Part way through they were looking promising,


It's very easy to get impatient and move the masks before everything has completely dried so I resisted the temptation to peak until the leaves started blowing off.


Reverse side above, 'right' side below.


I do like the marks you get on the reverse side!


Reverse of the stirrers and reels above, 'right' side below.








Reverse side above, 'right' side below.



 

Reverse side above, there are some lovely marks here where the salt has pulled the paint.


This above is the 'right' side and has some equally exciting marks.


Finally, the piece with the dried leaves, reverse above, 'right' side below.


Some of the finer elements have left some very delicate marks and I am pleased that in many instances the masks have retained some colour beneath them.  I still have to iron all the fabrics to fix the paint and then I'll probably think about them for some time before I actually get round to using them.  I have tried to link them with the colours I've used and have an idea or two lurking at the back of my mind for what I will use them for.  

I did get round to doing a little work on my Festival of Quilts entry and have bonded it lightly onto a felt backing ready for free machining.


The photo makes this look whiter than it is in reality as it has picked up on the gesso I used initially to secure pieces of scrim, newsprint, snippets of lace, broderie anglaise.  I intend it to be about the decay and deterioration of a building.  My difficulty at the moment is in deciding how to stitch it.  I have prepared a smaller sample to practice on but that will have to wait for a few days as life has to be lived. 

22 comments:

Jackie said...

Thank you for the photos of the steps you took; I've never seen nor heard of this before, Julie, and it's quite fascinating. I look forward to finding out what stitching you use.
Hugs,
Jackie

Ro Bruhn said...

What a lovely selection of sun prints. It's one of my favourite ways of printing fabric. I use mine as journal pages in my journals.

Lesley said...

I've never tried sun-printing........it looks fascinating.What exciting effects!

Sandra Wyman said...

These are gorgeous Julie!

I did read somewhere - I think an account by Sue Andrus - that it was possible to sunprint without sun - I think the idea was that as the uncovered fabric dried it drew the paint from under the masks - but I would assume you still need hot conditions for it to work (so not really suitable for most days of British summer!)

Anonymous said...

I think my comment just flew away. Lovely prints Julie, the crispness of the leaves is marvelous.mmFun stuff. xox

sweetypie said...

sandra is right, you can do it without sun or heat very effectivly , but your stuff is absolutely beautiful, and I really love the festival piece,wow, you are really firing on all cylinders...

Emma said...

Hey, you just go ahead & live it girl, we'll wait to hear about Mull!

Beautiful sun printing & what a fabulous start to the quitl.

ju-north said...

Great results with the printing! Can't wait to see what you do with them

Amanda said...

Right! I have a whole box of sun dyes, a large bolt of silk and now your inspiration.

Just one rather important thing missing....

Peneller said...

Wow Julie. These are really lovely. Shame it's raining today otherwise I'd be tempted to follow suit even though I don't really have time at the moment!

Maggi said...

Great results Julie. It's a good job you did it yesterday rather than today. The FOQ entry is looking very interesting and there are plenty of rainy days left before it has to be finished!

liniecat said...

Oh great results there.........always fun dying in the sun!

liniecat said...

Oh great results there.........always fun dying in the sun!

Su said...

That's something I've never tried. Fantastic results :-)

Angela said...

Nice to have you back Julie hope you had a great holiday. Your sun printing looks fabulous. It's some thing I've never done but keep meaning to do I really must make more of an effort. Look forward to seeing the results.

MulticoloredPieces said...

Hi, Julie. You got some gorgeous effects and colors with your sun-dying. It will be interesting to see what you do with them.
best, nadia

Felicity said...

what fun! and some gorgeous results.. i love the look of your FOQ quilt - it looks amazing already :)

cottonreel said...

I think a first visit to your blog . It is so good . use to be able to buy silk and poly for painting but the shop disappeared . Could you please email me as to where I could buy .
I love what you are showing

pam said...

You are so clever that looks fabulous

JP said...

fantastic results - good idea to use the sun on that day as it is not around much at the moment!!! - glad you are doing all these holidays!

Gina said...

Love the results of the sun printing!

Robin Mac said...

Fantastic results of your sunprinting - I like the reverse sides of some of them even better that the right side! Your Festival of Quilts entry looks wonderful even now so it will be interesting to see where you go from here. Cheers