As you can see, it’s a rather long list, but I think I can plow through quite a few of the items fairly quickly if I organize myself efficiently. At this level, I’m studying technique, not composition; I think that’s the better way to go. Composition is what you practice after you’ve developed skills, so I’m focusing on skills right now. (Mental note: add this to book!)
Anyway, I would normally start with immersion dyeing, but I have some friends coming over on Saturday to play with tie-dyes and Thermofax screening. This means mixing up lots of liquid (unthickened) dye for direct application, so I think I’m going to go with the flow and do the liquid dye section instead. This will be the first dyeing, so any resisted areas will come out white. Not ideal from a composition standpoint, but it will show off the technique very clearly (and can always be overdyed). Later in my experiments I will play with layering multiple techniques, but for now I’m going to work with one technique at a time.
I am thinking I will start with pretty small pieces (fat quarter size or even less – maybe 8×11 for the various resists) because these results aren’t meant for use in something, but will go straight into my dye notebooks. This means they need to fit into sheet protectors so I can keep records. This will also stretch out the yardage, so I can get more pieces from/try more techniques on my fifteen yards of fabric. So I think that’s a good thing.
So Saturday will be a full-on dye day, testing liquid dye with various resists. Friday will involve some prep work, as I want to put together a flour paste screen using the silkscreen frames I have at hand. (The flour paste needs a day to dry before it can be used.) I also want to try screen printing and stenciling various resists onto the fabric beforehand. Finally – and quite unscientifically – I want to finish off the T-shirts I started last week, and maybe make a few more.
Wow! What a lot of stuff. It looks like I have my summer’s work cut out for me.
Hey, Tien, I hadn’t checked in here in a while. Whew! You are a whirlwind of activity as always. Autumn Splendor is *splendid* — those leaves are the perfect finishing touch & I really enjoyed the closeup of the process. Congratulations on the house! And what a lot of interesting surface design you’re working through right now. Coincidentally, I’m planning on a t-shirt weekend here, with glue resist, wax resist, stamping, crayons, markers and puffy paint — very unsystematic, but I think it will be fun.
I wish I lived close to you!