Maybe getting some inspiration.

 I went to the AQC today, haven't been for a few years. 

It was busy around all the stalls, lots of lovely things I could have bought. I was relatively restrained but did buy a few little things - no fabric though, I have quite a good stash as it is. 

But I saw a couple of quilts that spoke to me. There were many beautiful and amazing quilts but these ones may be able to get me going again. One hopes. 

These will hopefully inspire me to do (and use) some more sun dyeing and eco-dyeing. I loved them!

  This was an amazing piece with free motion machine drawing!!

I liked this one because I like using scrim. And one of the members of our free motion machine embroidery group happened to bring a whole lot along last weekend - of course I took some, not knowing what I might use it for - now I am getting some ideas. 

All in all, a good day out!

Scrim and Gesso, sample 2

My second sample was not too different from the first.

I ironed the scrim to the adhesive interfacing, despite it tending to flatten the scrim.
If you do this, remember that scrim is very open weave and you need to cover it so your iron doesn't get all gooey.

I had a stamp that I had carved for another project and tried using it to make an impression in the gesso. The gesso was not very thick, so it left a faint image.
As the gesso attached itself to the stamp, I thought I might as well use that on the interfacing that did not have fabric attached.

It wasn't that impressive but did actually work better once I had painted it.
Once again, I used the leftover acrylic paints. I tried for a more uniform colour this time.

The advantage of this piece is that there is no sewing involved yet. It could be embellished later. 

It does take while to dry though, so I will have to see about using hair dryers, or similar. Our summer here in Melbourne is rather cool (I am NOT complaining) so we can't just let it dry quickly in the sun. 

Scrim and Gesso, sample 1

Having stupidly said I would take one of our Play Day sessions, I opted to try playing with scrim and gesso. As I haven't done it since last year, and as I can't actually think of a project to use it in, it is all a bit hard to think about.
However, I said I would do it and now I am playing around with it in the hopes that something will come to me that will work in a two hour session.

So ...
Over this weekend I have played.
I have made a few samples but, because I don't have a project in mind, have felt a bit at sea.
I am still considering what I might do about a fossil project that is coming up, so I have done my images based on that. But I haven't really chosen suitable colours, not knowing exactly what I want.

Still, it has been involving and allows me to think about this and not much else. So it has been a bit therapeutic.

I have taken some notes - most unusual for me! But I keep getting side-tracked and trying something that occurs to me at the time. So I had better get it all organised here before I forget what I did.

First try:

I have this image that I have used before. I traced it onto some adhesive interfacing. One thing I did find, ironing it to the adhesive interfacing tends to flatten the scrim, so I might try something different another time. 

Then I sewed it, using free motion on the machine, over the image. 

I decided that I needed to keep the edges controlled better and sewed them down too. 

Then I painted gesso onto it. Some of the gesso seemed rather thick, so I watered down some areas.  I made sure to get the gesso under the layers as much as possible. 

After it has dried, I painted it using some acrylic paint that was left in a palette that I had been using with some children. Waste not, want not. 

So no real plan for the colour scheme!

We have a theme, Ebb and Flow, coming up at the guild, so I might try to incorporate this technique in that. I can see waves and foam in the blue parts. 

Playing with gesso and textiles.

I have been considering trying a new technique. I saw an interesting chapter in a book: exploring creative surfaces by Lynda Monk.
My machine embroidery group at the Embroiderers Guild, Victoria, had the theme water, and I thought I would try to use a new technique, seeing it was a small piece and was just for play.

The chapter I came across was Creative Surfaces with Scrim. I love scrim!
I started with some white scrim and ironed it onto some adhesive interfacing.

Then I put Gesso over it.

Then I painted it with acrylic paints.

I didn't really have much of an image in mind, I was just playing. And I don't have a lot of acrylic paint, so just used the primary colours and blended them. (I do have black and white too, of course.)

As the textile was rather thick, I wasn't game to use my machine on it. I hand sewed a little bit to make it fit our Water theme.

This photo was taken at a different time of day and is rather murky. The actual piece does look a bit better than this!

I have some rather ancient silk dyes. I thought I might as well get them out and see what happened. It seemed to be much stronger colours, but I also seem to have smoothed the gesso out a bit more.

Then I decided to paint the interfacing (why not?) with silk dyes.
I also played with a small bit of Tyvek (I got it in a kit many years ago, I only have a small piece.)
I adhered the Tyvek to the scrim with Vliesofix .

The heated Vliesofix (I used an iron) shrank and pulled the scrim a bit more.

 I then ironed it onto the adhesive interfacing, as I had done with the other pieces.

At this stage, there was no gesso, so I smeared a small bit next to the Tyvek and it took the silk dyes a little differently.

You can see that I have painted some Tyvek too, the piece on the left. I haven't done anything with it yet.

I haven't played with it since October.  I have been tidying up - a little bit and I came across this in my visual diary and thought I might give it a go again soon.