I am making progress on the 'fish' quilt..which I'm calling "Nemo"...gee...I wonder why! HA I machine stitched the 'hidden' fish this past week! Then I painted two pieces of Mixed Media sheets by ICraft using blue and orange SetaColor paint. Then I traced some fish from good, old Dover books I had and the stitched them on top of a piece of old cut up quilt I had. Next I cut them out! Here are the two blue fish.
I have tried so many different color fish on this piece! Next I cut out an orange fish and placed him next to a blue one. He only looks angry because he has a pin in his body! HA
So I asked my buds what they thought! And, as with asking 3 folks, you get 3 opinions! HA One of my buds suggested I add some yellow to the blue fish to see if it toned the blue down. Here are all three! HA I don't care for the toned down fish..he may get flushed!
I personally like the contrast of the blue fish but I also like the orange fish. I think this project may hang in my room for a few days while I contemplate which fish will be part of "Nemo"!
First up, Blogger still hasn't fixed the issue of us receiving comments from folks! Please don't stop leaving comments...I will try to send emails to those of you that I have your contact info....
I mentioned in my last post the 'assistance' I received at our fiber art meeting last Monday. Well, here is another project they gave some input on!
I showed my buds two background pieces I quilted to audition the string art strips on. They really liked the orange background......
Then I laid out one of my deconstructed screen prints that I quilted and auditioned the string art for their input. Well, the keen eyes of my buds saw a fish in the background. You can see his eye 1/3 of the way from the top/left, between the two strips!
See the fish now! It really does look like a fish and he already has an eye!
So that took off on a discussion that I need to make this an under water piece! Add stitching to enhance the fish and find some more! The fish is just where I did some free motion quilting...leave it to my buds! So guess I'll work on pursuing this new path for the string art! Who knew they would mimic seaweed! Blue seaweed at that! HA
Well, now that I have lots of string art fabric, its time to do something with it! Last weekend I pulled out some screen printed fabric(s) and older hand dyes, as well as commercial fabrics. Let the auditions begin! I really liked the black/white commercial fabric with this particular string art piece. Then I added a screen printed piece as a border on the left side.
This was a blue printed fabric I just laid the string art piece on top of. Not bad...
Then I got thinking that I should cut strips of the string art and add sashing or borders between them.
Then I had a brain storm to cut out the string art design(s)! Best that I fused the back of the fabric before I cut out the design. Good thinking, right!
So back to auditioning fabric to lay my string art on! This was a screen print I did a few weeks ago.
Not bad...kinda like it!
Then I decided to look for fabric more on the dark gold or orange side. And what did I find! A setacolor print I did a long time ago! I took a class with Mickey Lawler on sun prints at QSDS and made two orange and two green prints.
I used the green sun prints of the leaf in this piece for an exhibit back in 2009. I did a re post of how I made the piece in 2015. You can see more detail here.
And I found the last burnt orange piece! I can't remember what I made but I know I've used the other leaf! Anyway, here is the last leaf...it measures 15" x 20"
And I really like the blue string art on top! So I've sandwiched the leaf and started to quilt it..just doing echo free motion around the leaves. Orientation won't be what you see in this picture. I just wanted to see if I liked the blue with the orange...and I do...I think! Guess we'll see...but it's a start!
I washed out my screen prints from last weekend and had time to kill so what to do! More string art on fabric. I've done two posts on creating string art on fabric. The first one was here and this was due to a Florida/Michigan bud, Bonnie! She posted a video on FaceBook showing string art on paper and one segment on a pair of jeans. In the first post, I did mention you have to hold down/put pressure on the fabric as you pull the string.
You can see the fabric was fold down, on top of the paint dipped string. Hence, the reverse of the pattern.
In my second string art on fabric post, I didn't put any pressure on the string/fabric and the results weren't bad. This was pulling the paint dipped string through multiple times.
So this time I decided instead of folding the fabric over on top of the string, I would lay a piece of fabric and apply slight pressure (starting at the bottom of the string) and I think the results are pretty good.
Fabric string laid on
Fabric laid on top
And a video! woohoo!! These are for you Bonnie!!! This is step 1! Well, my step one!
I didn't think I had the camera turned on for step 1 but surprise, surprise I did..hence, you have step 1! HA
And now Step 2!
Here are the results from the video. I think these turned out pretty cool! This was the fabric I laid the paint dipped string on.
And the fabric I laid on top in step 1 and held down in step 2.
Well, I made an attempt at videos...at least you'll get the idea! I hope...if not, it will refresh my memory when/if I attempt to do string art on fabric again!
I got to play on Wednesday making some more string art on fabric. Just a beautiful day out...so after walking the girls and weeding the front landscape...I played!
First off, I pin my fabric to a padded surface (foam board/batting/plastic...that's for another post if requested!). HA The fabric needs to be stable and not sliding all over. I also found that using the small T pins work great. Just remember to pin with the sharp end going towards the middle of your fabric. It keeps the pins from pulling away when you are doing any type of stamping, screen printing, etc. You may be able to see how I pinned the fabric in the video(s).
I also found a watery paint/dye (e.g. Dynaflow, Tsukienko inks) don't work well with this type of printing. I used Luminere and Neopaque fabric paints for these examples . Most paints are already the consistency you need, which is syrup like. If your paint is too thick, use Textile Medium and a little water.
I poured my paint into a carry out lid and then just dipped a light weight string into the paint. You can also add different color paints and spread throughout the string.
Let's be honest folks, I'm not a videographer, hence, the video's are what they are! Hopefully, you'll get a clue what to do or, if not, you'll find some things you shouldn't do! Either way...here we go!
Here is the first video for pulling the string through the fabric.
The next video shows pulling more string multiple times
Some results....
I numbered each of these 'pulls' (e.g. 1, 2, 3)...not sure why now! But I had a good reason when I did it! HA
And the last video I really covered the fabric pulling painted string through multiple times. Just having too much fun! I love the results on this piece.
I think you'll see in the video how I started off placing the string in a circle, in the middle...then I started to pull more paint through the piece.
And the final piece...I think I pulled string through at least 6-8 times or more. Yes, you need to dip your string with each pull in the paint. Just in case you didn't notice that!
My Jason Pollock piece!
This is a fun technique and I can see using this last piece (or even some of the others) in a art quilt! And if you are into painting on canvas or in your journals, just go to YouTube.com and type in 'string pulling art' in the search area. You'll see some really cool ways to create beautiful designs using canvas or paper for your background piece vs fabric. I haven't found a 'fabric pull' other than the FB post but they placed fabric on top of fabric to do the pull...that works too. Try them all!!!
About a week ago, a video was posted several times (I first saw it from bud, Bonnie from Michigan) on FaceBook! It's 'Art with Liquid Ink' by Nha Hay. I just went through her posts and she's quite creative! Now to this latest technique!
I dipped a heavy cord in ProFab concentrate
Too much ink on the cord
Once you lay the string on your paper you close the book and hold the page and pull the string/cord out!
For some reason, turning pics in photo program isn't working...this is a journal I keep my stamp printing in. Is this cool!
I kept using the same cord without dipping back in ProFab
This time I used a string on fabric I had fold, laid left fold side on top and pulled the string through.
I did lay a book on top for pressure but I didn't hold hard enough. Hence, next pic shows very faded design.
Again, using string but this time I did apply more pressure using a book on top of folded fabric and pulled string through
I love the results!
I used string again, rather than cord, and Tsukineko inks to dip string in and same method....
It's really a matter of the pressure you use. Again, this is on fabric, muslin.
You can see how faded the marks are in the background so I laid the string on again and pulled through.
Yep, this was a third try...to be honest, I think I re inked the string! Can't remember but I like the results!
I like the faded design in the back.
Pretty cool, right!
Probably my favorite on fabric....now to think of a project to use these on or else a project to start from the get go!!!
