Rust Shoreline
Rust Shoreline detail
Rust Ripples
Rust Ripples detail
Greenhouse Door Rust
Rusted silk habotai couched on digital print of peeling paint of Alston Hall greenhouse door
African Scrap Door
( no rusted fabrics: Ndobe indigo, African Kola and Indigo, Potassium permanganate, commercial )
The question of what you do with the bits you produce on workshops: use them in Journal Quilts.
I enjoyed trying out rusting on fabrics and papers using teas with Alice Fox and produced some lovely marks on small pieces ( thanks
Olga for highlighting my efforts on the
Ragged Cloth Café blog) . I made up
a small book and applied the stitched pieces to pre-machine quilted backgrounds. I love the resulting textures of these but I don't think I will be pursuing this technique further as after the initial excitement , I'm struggling to work out how I incorporate them in my main series.
It's partly a scale issue: I prefer yardage such as my indigo shibori to small pieces, however exquisite, and I'm a quilter not an embroiderer. It's a process issue:Alice does not wash or iron the the resulting fabrics liking the folds and creases and applies these to felt or other fabrics. That fits her aims and ethos but not mine. It's a fabric issue: the nicest marks were on thin silk habotai which I can't easily mix with the cottons I usually use. Mainly though it's a colour issue: as a painter the marks, colours and especially tones achieved are just too subtle and unpredictable .
I overheard several times people stating authoratively that my 'Fleet Mudflats' quilt contained rust marked fabrics. It doesn't - it's a mixture of commercial printed fabrics and African kola and indigo with some digital prints of sand ripples. My
African Scrap Door JQ above also contains no rusted fabrics.
Fleet Mudflats
When you learn a technique or process, however much you admire the work and ethos of the tutor, you have to decide whether it fits with your own work. On this occasion I have no immediate use for it - I'm happier with faux rust effects. But having learnt it , it's in my arsenal for the future if appropriate.
