Saturday, February 17, 2024

colour

colour preferences seem to follow me across the spectrum of whatever I have my fingers in at any given time...

what can I say?

I like what I like

right now it appears what I like is grey and some form of khaki... maybe a hint of black-brown or a light smear of grey-tinged blue 


it's followed me from watercolour to pigment-painting cloth

yesterday I used Roman Black and layered the cloth over dried and pressed leaves and carrot flowers

the resulting prints aren't all clearly defined but it's still an interesting surface





a second cloth was painted with Light Sienna and Indigo

pinch-pleated tall grasses/leaves
(yep, still on that theme!)

it was interesting how the pigments settled on the edges of some of the pleats, especially the left side

I have to wait four weeks before taking an iron to the cloth to allow the colour to cure but you can see the effect peeking out from under a few of the pleats


the reverse, or underside is shown below

the pigments settle through the cloth and the extent to which they do that depends on their individual weight

I find it an interesting consideration though I  haven't taken it too seriously yet


once the wait is over and I can press this I'll decide if I'm keeping it as is, ready to work into with stitch perhaps, or if I should add more paint

it's a slow process with a lot of time for considering and reflection and I quite like that

no rush, no attachment to any outcomes (at least not yet), just a finding a way forward and learning as I go


4 comments:

Christine Barnes said...

Fascinating textures. Do you need to press the cloth? Maybe a couple of samples could be left un-ironed so that the creases remain raised? I love the traces of the plant shapes in the grey cloth - they are subtle to be sure but I love that and they will add mystery and depth to anything you add to the surface. They remind me of marks made on the walls of ancient caves... or fossils even. They certainly have a feeling of history and story.

Christine Barnes said...

Looking again at the pinched cloth - I love the underside which I also think resembles marks in stone - history... marks left long ago by people or nature - how things are shaped in the past to become what they are today.

Rachel said...

We have been discovering from my mother's courses with Hazel Soan that the weight, size and transparency of pigment particles have all sorts of subtle effects on the way that pigment is expressed, so the subtleties of your effects build on the interactions between fabric and pigment..

Magpie's Mumblings said...

I think I like the reverse side the best, although I was struck by the pigments being darker on the left side and thought how it reflects a light source without you even trying.