Soy Batik Improvisation

Detail of Stop Fear. You can see the entire quilt at the International Quilt Festivals this year!

I've just been notified that my art quilt, Stop Fear (Homage to Sister Corita Kent) has made it into the juried SAQA exhibit, Text Messages. Yippee! This piece was principally designed using a large one-color soy wax batik that I made a few years ago -- and i've had such a good time working with it, that I'm itching to get back into the studio next week for a few day-long soy wax sessions. I am also sending out soy batik lessons this week on Joggles, part of my MORE TEXT ON TEXTILES online workshop. 

Sister Corita Kent has long been an inspiration to my work, and I can’t think of using text in art without thinking of her. This batik and, even more importantly, its message, speak of her influence on my life and in my work. I was first introduced to a version of traditional batik using beeswax and parafin mixture and inkodyes when I was in my 20s -- it must have been the first surface design technique I learned and the teachers were visiting Sister Corita students who worked with us in our creative arts for kids programs one summer -- maybe 1967 or '68?

Inkodyes are still around -- and they are VERY light and water fast -- but I had heard that their toxicity is higher than MX dyes, so I've left them alone in the past several decades -- the colors, too are hard to mix, since  -- kind of like ceramic glazes -- the color that goes onto the fabric is very different than the color that develops in sunlight as the dyes develop. However, this site with its app for making registered three color photo prints just might change my mind! This is what the site says about toxicity:

Our dyes and resist have been certified as having no chronic toxicity by an independent toxicologist. Our products conform to the Labeling of Hazardous Art Materials Act (Conforms with ASTM D-4236). We are committed to the health and safety of everyone who enjoys Inkodye, which is why we recommend using normal precaution to prevent unnecessary spilling, skin contact and ingestion. Children love to watch the magical color development, but should not use Inkodye unsupervised. Our dyes are water-based and only require household soap and water cleanup - we recommend that you wash your hands thoroughly after use and / or use gloves to prevent prolonged skin contact and staining! We recommend using the sun to develop your prints, but if you choose to iron wet Inkodye articles indoors please work in an environment with adequate ventilation! 

At any rate, if you do use inkodyes with soy batik, you can wash out the wax after the dyes develop without using an iron -- bound to be better for the lungs and environment. 

Basically, soy wax can be used as with traditional batik, but you can't immerse fabric without running the risk of it dissolving too much of your wax resist -- so the technique requires that you paint on your intense low-water type dye mix (including soda ash and urea to retard drying) and then batch under plastic, removing plastic to dry the fabric, then adding another layer of wax -- or you can wash out the soy wax between colors. -- hot water and detergent turns it into soy oil that washes down the drain. Alternatively use Inkodyes, according to directions.

(PS Thanks Nina-Marie for the invitation to add this link to your off-the-wall Friday posting!

Here are a few photos of the process:

You can also use an electric skillet. Be very careful with temperatures and keep a lid handy in case things get out of hand. Do not heat the wax so hot that it smokes. Fortunately soy wax fumes are not toxic or allergenic (as is the case with paraffin and bees wax fumes).

Another way to use soy wax is to use it with a thin paint, as I am doing here. Be sure the wax is hot enough that it makes the fabric a bit transparent looking-- the wax need to go all the way through the fabric.

You can take some of the wax out by ironing first -- if you use paint, you must iron it before you put it in the washer in order to set the paint, then put your fabric in hot soapy washer in the machine. Sometimes, with heavy wax applications, it may take two trips through the washer. 


Live, on a screen near you!



MIXED MEDIA TEXTILE ARTS!

The Quilting Arts people launched my video workshop this week. Take a peek. Buy it now! I am so jazzed to see this, especially since I thought I was really lame in the first part of the taping, but they know how to edit a segment...

Here's what the newsletter says:


Mixed-Media Textile Art Workshop DVD Available Now!

Be among the first to take Susie Monday's new workshop!  Mixed-Media Textile Art, the newest of our Cloth Paper Scissors Workshop™ DVDs, is now available. Get ready to take your mixed-media textile art to the next level with Susie's masterful demonstrations.  At your own convenience and in the comfort of your own home or studio, you can explore new techniques and enhance your design skills.

 

You can order from Interweave in the link below, or wait til I get wholesale copies that I can autograph and personalize for your library -- and I'll include a few pdf downloadable related lessons, too!

 

Mixed-Media Textile Art (DVD)

 

And while you're shopping, you might want to take a look at Jane Dunnewald's new DVD on screenprinting. It's a perfect complement to my DVD if you don't know anything about prepping a screen or making your own -- even this preview will get you started!

Order from Jane's Corner

Here's a note that Jane Dunnewold, my friend and mentor, put on out on one of the online lists this week. If you plan to order Jane's new book ART CLOTH -- an update and reworking of what is certainly one of the classic resources of the surface design field, COMPLEX CLOTH -- then do her the favor of ordering from her Art Cloth website. I certainly will. And, even better, add my name to the drawing for one of Jane's wonderful pieces of art.

"I was dismayed to go to Amazon and see how deeply discounted my new book will be - even before it has been released. I know that's the way of the world, but it led me to some serious thinking about how to compete with discounting while offering value to those who are committed to sticking with and supporting artists by spending a bit more - rather than going for the discount. With that in mind, I've decided to host a "raffle" of sorts - to thank those of you who are willing to support artists first hand - without the middle person, like Amazon, involved.

Anyone who pre-orders my new book on my website - complexcloth.com - will automatically be entered in a drawing for two of my larger works of art. The pieces are yet to be determined - I need to get some work back from Interweave before I can make the decision about what to offer, but they will be GOOD pieces. The drawing will occur on June 1, 2010. Anyone who has already pre-ordered from my website is automatically "in."

Please feel free to pass this on to other lists and friends. I am not
against Amazon at all, but am interested in leveling the playing field so that I might actually be able to hold my own against big business! And may I say, while engaging in a little fun with an outcome a couple of people will really enjoy!

(Is Amazon the equivalent of an on-line big box store? Am I the local corner artist?)

Cheers,
Jane

and yes, every copy ordered on the website will be personally signed."

 

Art Cloth Before and After

Jane Dunnewold, who as anyone who reads me regularly knows is a mentor, friend and shining beacon in my life, has published a new blog as the venue for an art cloth challenge she issued last year. From a pool of "applicants" she chose a group of us to develop a piece of art cloth from a two-yard challenge piece that she sent-- all identically dyed with mixing blue with a series of small bound-resist circles down the middle of the length.The site is at: Art Cloth Challenge 2008 <http://artclothchallenge.blogspot.com/>

Now the results are in and up on-line at site. Scroll down near the end to find out more about the piece I made, after you've taken time to read the others! Warning: this is a return-to site. There's so much to learn about approach, process, the creative journey, the paths that different artists take from the same impulse and materials. I'm still reading and enjoying!

Fall Newsletter is "in the mail"


I hope. I seemed to have spent an inordinate amount of time NOT sending my newsletter -- making stupid technology errors. Every time I do this I swear I'm going to get a service that handles it -- and then another quarter rolls around and I haven't made the transition. I know that keeping my email list up to date and clean is an essential part of doing business these days, but it sure is boring.

Anyhow, that's the back story whine (whoops, switch that bracelet around) and here's the link to the newsletter up in cyberspace. If you'd like a subscription all your own (and didn't already get the mailing), just send me an email with SUBSCRIBE in the subject line. susiemonday@gmail.com.

P.S. I am taking Lily Kern's Quilt University on-line course on Digital Photos on Fabric, in preparation for some workshops and to experience the online teaching and learning environment. I'm learning a lot, and mostly, having fun playing in Photoshop with some of the images I've collected over the years. The pomegranate images in this blog are the results of a few hours of fiddling around with different effects. I've been printing them out on fabric, so don't be surprised to see them on one of my textile paintings in the future. I'll be sharing some of Lily's tips (as well as a lot more garnered in other research) at my Southwest School of Art course next weekend -- Photos to Fabric, October 11-12, from 10-4 daily. There's still room for a few more participants if you are interested in learning more about using photos in your fiber art. Go to the SWSchool website to register online. We'll be preparing fabric with Bubble Jetset, using various transfer methods, playing with software (bring a laptop if you have one), trying out repeat designs and tiling photos to poster size images, and turning a photo into a good image for thermofax printing. Email me if you have questions.

And, don't forget about the El Cielo workshop on Oct. 17-19: Altares, Dias de los Muertos.