Attempts at Shibori

In the second post for High Noon in January I had included a picture of a piece of fabric prepared for Shibori-dyeing, which drew a positive comment from Claire. To which I replied that I would finally do something to this piece, which had been waiting for a long time, and that I would do it ‘this month’. That was February. Nothing like a public statement to put a bit of pressure on yourself! On February 28 I finally mixed the color with which I wanted to dye the various pieces I had prepared, some of them long ago, some just recently.

These are photos of stages of the process:

Wetting the pieces to slow down the process
of the colour molecules binding with the fabric
(I learned that when translating for Jan Myers-Newbury)

Each piece gets its own container, although they
will all be treated with the same colour

Not a whole lot of water, although more than with
Low Water Immersion Dyeing

Set out to dry before removing the pebbles

I was lucky in that I had a visitor last week who turned helper for removing the stones – my supporting dyer Regine, who already was a companion when I was dyeing the samples collection that finally led to the beginnings of my fabric club and dyeing business. This time, she was paid well with several litres of freshly brewed ginger-lemon-tea.

This is what the pieces looked like after removing the pebbles:

And here the pieces are, completely washed and ironed.

I am very pleased with the results. First, I am glad I did not use white fabric, but fabric that had been dyed once already. Secondly, I am quite satisfied that the blue I used now was not too dark, although it will be interesting to experiment with other, darker types of colors for the overdyeing. Thirdly, I really like the effects of the tied-in stones. The different types of tieing I used - evenly spaced and very close together, small and large stones, more or less apart, and different amounts of thread tied around yielded interesting and different results. Each has its own charm.
There is a lot of experimenting ahead of me. Even though I don't really feel drawn to wrapping fabric around poles and tyeing it - mostly because of the limitation in size of fabric pieces that can be treated. But there are many pieces in my collection that promise interesting results. And take a lot less time than tieing in pebbles. Which I will still do more of, this was so much fun (except the taking-out-the-stones part of it...).

Workshop with Nancy Crow – viewed in retrospection

Day before yesterday I returned home from my two-week-stay in Falera (CH), where I participated in two workshops by Nancy Crow and translated two workshops by Jan Myers-Newbury.

results from shibori class drying on the line

my first attempts at shibori...

Because some of my boxes are supposed to be stored in a room where a guest of ours is sleeping I have not unpacked the car yet. But this morning I took out my notebook from another workshop with Nancy Crow which I took a couple of years ago and which had a similar topic („Figure/Ground Composition“) and tried to compare what we did then with this workshop („Lines, Curves, Circles, Figure and Ground“). I had consciously not looked at the older notebook before leaving for Falera, because I wanted to approach this new class with a clear mind.

It was very noticeable that the design exercises differed a lot, both classes were structured on a different principle. For one thing, we did not do any black-and-white studies a few years ago, and we were supposed to bring some inspirational pictures, which had not been asked for this time around.

"The Walks of Life in Yellow" -
 finished quilt from a figure/ground workshop
with Nancy Crow four years ago

I have to admit that I had found the figure/ground class a very difficult one then, and I still think it is one of the most challenging parts of composition in my quiltmaking. However, during this class I sometimes had the feeling that the whole problem got more and more complicated if I think about it too consciously. I don’t want to say that working from the guts is always the best way in this matter, but certainly a lot of careful thinking doesn’t make it any easier. It is definitely an aspect that will keep me on my toes for a long time to come.

This time, I had started the last design exercise almost a whole day later than all the others. I had fallen behind due to the interpreting, and had decided that I wanted to finish the second exercise before I started on the last one instead of taking it back in pieces. At least that I managed.

First sketches for the last exercise were put to paper during a nice chat with my house-mates after dinner.

Nancy pretty quickly approved of them, with the addition „We’ll have to see what it looks like when you put it up on the wall first, though.“ So although I did feel a few reservations about cutting more black shapes, I did go about it, put up a first design,, and was pushed a bit by Nancy to make it better before she gave me a ‘go ahead’.

Black-and-white design for last exercise in workshop

When receiving the instructions I definitely had the feeling that the result of this exercise could look nothing better than a workshop piece, which had not exactly enamoured me of it. The last exercise in the earlier class had been much more openly formulated and resulted in individual and original designs, whereas already the three-part format that was a strict given this time must result in much look-alike. Add to that the “use as may colours as possible”, and you get many tops that somehow look alike. 

Nevertheless, I did begin putting my design into fabric, and I might even go ahead and continue to sew it. For one thing, I want to practise and familiarize myself with a new technique that I learned about. But I also think that I could definitely learn a lot by pushing this one through. It might look just like a workshop piece in the end after all. But that’s ok. That’s what workshops are for, to learn something, and then to have a piece which reminds you of the fact that you did learn that thing doing exactly this piece.

I hope that these two weeks will reamin with me for a while – and not only because of sewing this top together and finishing the other three that are completely sewn.

First attempt at Arashi Shibori

During my hours with the dyeing class with Jan Myers-Newbury I got to borrow a pole and try my hands at a first piece of Shibori. It was an ugly fabric before - although I haven't figured out yet, how I would use it, I think it looks much better now.

Workshop with Nancy Crow - 2nd week

Last Friday my second function here in Falera began, after all, I am not here for pure entertainment. I am the interpretor for two Shibori workshops taught by Jan Myers-Newbury. During those times when Jan is not doing a lot of explaining but the participants have to work, wrapping poles, packing or clamping, taking care of the dye baths or whatever I jump over to the other building where the sewers are at work and try to get a bit of my own work done inbetween. Of course a constant change of scene does not really give me good opportunities to work as concentrated on my pieces as the other participants can. However, I can be pretty focussed even in short periods of time, so I am pretty happy with this arrangement. Otherwise I would not have been able to come here at all. In fact, I am learning a lot about Shibori that way and have the feeling that I am getting the best of two worlds that way.

The cut-up top from last week found Nancy’s approval and looks like this right now:

And that assignment that I did not have time for at the end of last week is already growing in my mind, I will try to put it into fabric as soon as possible after my return.

Over the weekend I spent most of the time with the Shibori class. Über das Wochenende war ich zu großen Teilen bei den Färberinnen im Kurs. Without being an active participant in the class myself I have already understood why my own attempts at Shibori from last summer were not very successful, which I had started after reading Janice Gunner’s book on shibori techniques.

I am certainly going to try more after I return home.

Let me show you a few impressions from the Shibori-class. The pieces are hung up to dry on the line in the school yard after rinsing, and because there is mostly a light wind they are dry in not time at all.

In Nancy’s class we have again started sewing in black and white. However, we progressed to colous today, and my current design for this exercixe looks like this:

I will start putting it into colour tonight.

Daily Oak - amended rules

In my first report on my daily art project 'Daily Oak' I reported that I had missed only one day in the month of January.


In February, I have already missed two because I was out of town visiting my parents. 
And I am going to miss at least two more, because I will be spending this weekend out of town, too, and although I plan to catch an early shot tomorrow morning right after taking my son to kindergarten, I will not be able to do so on Saturday and Sunday. When I returned from my visit to my parents, I tried to take a late night picture, but due to the situation with the street lamps (Daily Oak is standing right at an intersection) that doesn't work at all, and a return after sunset definitely means 'no picture on that day'. Which will happen on Sunday, too. 
While I was thinking about this - and the more and more numerous days looming ahead when I will be traveling to North Carolina in April, taking a family holiday with my husband and son during the summer, or two weeks in Falera in Switzerland, interpreting for Jan Myers-Newbury and taking a class with Nancy Crow, and how that would look on the statistics, I came up with an idea for an amendment of my rules:


On every day that I am not in town, I will try to take a picture of another impressive tree wherever I am and include these in the overall project, featuring them as "Guest Trees", so to speak.
But I only came up with this idea this morning, so I am lacking two pictures for February 5 and February 6. I did take a nice picture of trees on the evening of February 4 just across the street from my parents' house, but it can't feature in Daily Oak, because I have pictures for February 4:

So here is my request for help: Is anybody out there who took  a picture of a tree or trees on February 5 and February 6? Send them in, I will post them in the report on March 1. Similarly for this upcoming weekend - after all, I may not find a really nice one. Take your chance, submit a guest tree to this blog!
Looking forward to what I may receive!