Exciting and disappointing

Exciting being included in a book, disappointing that the credit lines aren't accurate. pg. 57 "work on opposite page by Gail Pierce and Val Foster." This implies that my journal pages are the top ones; not! Mine are on the bottom of this beautifully printed book, "Collaborative Art Journals" by L.K. Ludwig. I wonder if there are other mistakes? The book is great eye candy, but I doubt it will be off of my bookshelf very often.
(click on photo to enlarge.)

Seven new photos on http://g-photosi.blogspot.com/ It's time to stop production in the wet studio; the intense heat has struck! Hard for me to believe that so many in the country live in areas where the temps are so low that heaters are required. The AC has been on for months and the temps in the garage even with a portable AC aimed at me are unbearable. I do have a nice small stash of dyed and screen printed fabric to experiment with over the summer and into the fall. The plan is to concentrate on FME and create hand-made stamps and other tools to use on fabric.

Quote about travel: The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page. St. Augustine. (I'm off to Italy in less than a week!)

#35 of 52 projects

Glue resist on screen. The purple is textile paint. Being that this piece doesn't look like much I thought I'd show the first layer. What to do with all of the white? Some of the prints look like batik while others are lifeless.

Components: textile paint screened print, watercolor crayons, dyed cheesecloth hand-stitched

on, edge-stitched.

Mosey on over to g-photos to see why I'm in a rush to get more dyeing and screen printing done!

http://g-photosi.blogspot.com/

Quote: And I'm proud to be an American, where at least I know that I'm free. And I won't forget the men who died who gave that right to me. Lee Greenwood. (In honor of Memorial Day weekend.)

#34 of 52 projects

Grids seem to have replaced circles, guess I'll go where the muse leads me.

Components: glue resist on muslin. Handmade grid stamps, buttons attached with orange-red thread. Probably the only thing that remotely saved this piece is the blue and white grid. One of my rules for a 52 project is that I have to finish a piece regardless . . .

Quote for Memorial Day weekend: When we say "War is over if you want it," we mean that if everyone demanded peace instead of another TV set we'd have peace. John Lennon

#33 of 52 projects

Interesting, didn't I just post that I had moved on from hearts? While I was trolling through scraps looking for something useful to create for #33 I discovered this one. I think that I meant it be #29.

Components: handmade stamps on hand dyed fabric for base. Screen printed purple and ochre hearts, textile paint plus cookie cutters used as stamps.

Quote: Nothing is a waste of time if you use the experience wisely. Rodin

#32 of 52 projects

Do you ever find the perfect button? I rarely do especially in my collection. I wasn't even thinking button when I found this one mixed in with junk jewelry.

Components: hand dyed fabric scraps. The blue was needle punched, #29, and the piece across the width of this 4x6 inch piece was scrunch dyed.

Quote: The mind that is anxious about future events is miserable. Seneca (sounds like something you'd find in a fortune cookie.)

#31 of 52. More grids plus circles.

As mentioned, I thought that it might be time to return to circles after working in the land-of-heart-motifs but I wasn't expecting grids to sneak their way in. All of the stamps in this piece are from my recent stamp making session. I'm sure that most will figure out the grids, but for now I'm tight-lipped regarding how I've done them. Thanks for the comments and emails!

Components: I had cut off the bottom of a larger piece done on unbleached muslin and the remaining section only had one and half grayish circles on it. Oops, I didn't create the swirly background stamp, in yellow and blue. That background stamp is barely visible. Grids, circles and a design stamp in blues and red textile paint brought the piece to life. Machine stitching, feather stitch in red and edge stitching finished this 4x6 inch piece. (click on the photo to enlarge.)

Quote: New York . . . is a city of geometric heights, a petrified desert of grids and lattices, an inferno of greenish abstraction under a flat sky, a real Metropolis from which man is absent by his very accumulation. Roland Barthes - French Critic 1915-1980

#30 of 52 projects

Grids, oh how I love them.

Components: background is hand dyed palomino gold bleached muslin. Hand made stamp, grid, stamped in blue and white on blue green dyed unbleached muslin; raw frayed edges. The blue muslin was machine stitched in red onto the gold fabric and finally edge stitched. Confusing.

Basically, it's two pieces of hand dyed fabric, one stamped and sewn onto the base fabric and machine stitched. (click on photo to enlarge)

Quote:The secret of a grids success is not so much its structure as the imagination with which it is used. Allen Hurlburt

#29 of 52 projects

(click on photo to enlarge)
Being that I veered off track with #27 and #28 I took a break to see if I could get back on course. I think that I have. The two lutradur pieces didn't exactly follow the guidelines I gave myself. During the last 6 weeks I've been dyeing fabric along with creating oodles of screen prints. I've learned a lot including that I take lousy notes! The rush is on to get as much done in the garage studio as I can before the nights stay as hot as the days are, 102 degrees today, because then I won't be able to work in the garage. When it cools down at night the portable AC unit works. Today the AC unit was stuck at 92 degrees, which seems unbearable, but the air blasting out of it aimed directly at me is doable.

Components: Rust dyed fabric that was over-dyed with turquoise dye. Bits and pieces of scraps including threads were needle punched onto the muslin. A purple painted strip of lutradur was sliced down the middle leaving about an inch at the heat. The strip was heat distressed and machine sewn onto the 4x6 inch piece.

Notes: muslin doesn't hold up when needle punches excessively in on area. To trap the scraps I placed a piece of netting over the entire surface but the needles kept pulling up the scraps anyway so I ended up needle punching the backside.

Quote: She would be half a planet away, floating in a turquoise sea, dancing by moonlight to flamenco guitar. Janet Fitch - White Oleander

Disintegration - moving on

This papers looked untouched, but they were out in the elements since Feb. I made three bundles of them and pulled away some debris in the compost bin and in they went. What am I expecting? Worms to gnaw on the paper, stains from garden clippings and/or vegetable waste from the kitchen. Time frame: July 1, or later. I need enough time to create a piece. I'm moving on to more fabric dyeing and returning to the 52 projects.

Quote: Moving on is a simple thing, what it leaves behind is hard. Dave Mustaine
Sometimes the cards we are dealt are not always fair. However we must keeping smiling and moving on. Tom Jackson.

More Disintegration

The photos that I posted about earlier today needed to dry before I could scan them. This is one that started to transfer onto a piece of paper. Great possibilities for photos that refuse to print properly. Another reason to "save everything!"

More photos can be seen here:

Disintegration Project unveiling

A cloud covering here in the desert isn't typical, but it's lovely for the unveiling of the bundles; the lighting is soft, perfect for photographing. I tied my bundles to the pergola post where grape vines are doing their Jack-in-the-beanstalk thing. My bundles have been out in the elements since Feb. 14 and can be seen here.

This bundle slid down the post last month during a monsoonal storm. Underneath of the bundle mold started to develop, see the last photo.

Epson DuraBrite printed photographs. So much for being smudge, water and fade resistant! They did what I wanted them to do! A few of the images even transferred to the backs of scrapbook paper as shown in the middle of this example. Eureka!

An interesting design started developing on the copper, another example of a photo, and the corrugated cardboard that will now go into another bundle that I'm considering popping into the compost pile for awhile. The cardboard didn't do much.

One sheet of paper to be saved for later use. The rest will be bundled up again.

Some mold action. I'll probably seal it with a spray coat of clear something. I had hoped that the twine would decay some, it has before when we've used it to stake plants; I'll most likely use it to tie the bundles with again.

I'm definitely fascinated by intentional disintegration and plan to do more of it. Thanks Seth!

Quote: Disintegration -- I'm taking it in stride. Bret Easton Ellis (American Psycho)