Exhibitions
VISUAL ARTS ASSOCIATION, CAIRNS
:: 6 Dec 03 - Mar 04
:: ATRIUM GALLERY
I have been invited by the VAA in Cairns to be part of an upcoming Exhibition - such an honour! I am one of 6 artists working in different mediums (I am the textile representative), and I'll be displaying handpainted silk artworks for 3 months.
You can view photos of the Exhibition at
www.abfab-australia.com/exhibitions.html
If you'd like to share info with the other Members about your own exhibitions etc, please email me on
info@australiansilkworm.com and let me know.
SILK IN SANTA FE FESTIVAL :: July 2004
SILK PAINTERS INTERNATIONAL (SPIN) in the USA have chosen me to be one of the Tutors for a 3 day silk painting class in Santa Fe, New Mexico (USA) in July 2004, and I am honoured to be part of this prestigious group.
There are approximately 10 other tutors offering wonderful classes in many facets of silk painting and techniques, this is an event not to be missed!
Every 2 years, SPIN holds a Festival in the USA and silk artists and visitors from around the globe come to the week-long festival to learn more about silk, meet the suppliers of the products and see them in action, and to network with like-minded souls from many countries.
I am the Australian Festival Co-ordinator, if you'd like more info please email me at
info@australiansilkworm.com (we already have an Aussie contingent booking their trips), or go to:
the SPIN website ::
www.silkpainters.org
or the Festival website ::
www.silkinsantafe.com
Steaming Silk with a Pressure Cooker
Carolyn Earl has written a beautiful book on silk painting, and gives details how to steam using a pressure cooker on the stove. For more information, please read Carolyn's book.
The Silk
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Place the dried, unfixed silk painted pieces onto some thin cotton material or absorbent paper such as wallpaper lining paper.
Wallpaper lining may be too narrow for large pieces of silk, so simply join two strips together with a few short pieces of double-sided tape along the centre overlap. As you lay out the finished work, make sure that there is a gap of about 5cm (2 inches) between each piece (so no silk touches another piece), with a similar amount at the outer edges. This well prevent the pieces touching each other as the work is rolled up.
Rolling the silk
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Carefully roll up the unfixed pieces of silk, ensuring that the cotton fabric or absorbent paper is not creased. Try not to make the roll too tight; keep it loose and squashy so it is easier to coil up and fit into a pressure cooker pan. Seal up one end of the roll with tape and coil the roll, beginning with the sealed end.
Secure, and seal up the other end of the completed coil with a few pieces of masking tape or sticky tape to prevent it from uncoiling. To ensure that the coil does not come undone during the fixing process, tie a piece of string around it, checking that there are no long ends of string that could trail into the water during the fixing. This coil shape is often referred to as a parcel.
The Pressure Cooker
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Put 2cm (3/4 inch) of water in the base of the pressure cooker pan, and then place a trivet or stand in the base of the pan for the parcel to sit on (parcel must not touch water anywhere!). If you do not have a trivet, make one by folding a good length of kitchen foil into a stiff strip about 10cm (4 inches) deep and coiling this up to form a stand (to sit the paper/silk parcel on). The parcel must NOT come in direct contact with the water (and must not touch the sides of the pan).
Put the parcel on the trivet, and place a domed hat (made of kitchen foil shaped over a budding basin or bowl), on top of the parcel. This prevents any droplets of condensation dropping from the lid of the pressure cooker on to the coil during steaming. It should be replaced as soon as small pinprick holes appear in the foil after a couple of steamings. Using the complete pressure cooker weights, place the lid of the pressure cooker on the base and close together.
On the stove
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Quickly bring the water to the boil to pressurise the pan, but once the pan is pressurised (shown by the weight rattling or the valve coming up), reduce the heat right down to a simmer setting. This should be just sufficient to maintain the pressure, and cook for 20 minutes from this point.
As a rough guide, 20 minutes is sufficient for up to 2.5 metres (yards) of fabric, or an 8 foot running length of light- or medium-weight silk. Should the pressure drop during this time, just increase the heat slightly and add another few minutes.
Steaming done
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After the correct cooking time, turn off the heat or remove the pressure cooker from the heat source, and allow the pressure to drop. Once the pressure has dropped you can safely open the lid of the pressure cooker and remove and unwrap the parcel while it is still warm. If you have used water-based outliners, ALWAYS open the parcel while it is still warm, as it is easier to detach any silk that has stuck to the paper during the fixing.
If you find that any pieces of silk are really stuck to the paper through heavy usage of outliner, particularly on chiffon or lightweight silk, do not try to force the silk away from the paper. Carefully tear the paper around the problem area, leaving the paper attached to the silk. Then place the silk with the stuck paper still attached into the rinsing water and gently agitate the silk. The water will quickly soften the water-soluble outliner and allow the pieces of paper to be removed without damaging the silk.
Washing
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Allow the fixed pieces to settle and cool down before washing each piece of fixed silk in warm water and with a little liquid detergent to remove any traces of water-soluble outliner, excess colour or salt deposits. As the silk fabric can only absorb a given quantity of dye, any excess dye will sit on the surface of the fabric and be washed away at the rinsing stage, so do not be overly concerned at a slight discolouration of the water. To avoid staining the silk during the rinsing process, gently move it around in the rinse water rather than just leaving it to soak, so any excess dye will not settle on the silk and stain it. Discard the first water and rinse again in clean water. Squeeze out any surplus water, then iron the fixed pieces of silk while damp to remove any creases and restore the sheen.
#### copyright to Caroline Earl ###
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Silk Frames
Making a PVC frame on which to stretch and paint silk
A friend has recently created a pvc frame which she can pack in her suitcase and take on her travels - what a great idea!
Go to
www.pvc.com for links to suppliers of various pvc connectors in the USA. Have a look at the "snap clamp", which is used to hold greenhouse plastic or screen around a pvc pipe, and also works for silk.
This means the silk you stretch over the pvc pipe will be covered with the plastic clamp, and left unpainted, but that's ok. Once the silk is stretched, you could draw a gutta line around the inside of the stretched silk.
The pvc (plumbers' pipe) only needs to be about 0.75-1.00 inch across, is lightweight, and easy to clean. Buy 4 corner connectors to hold it all together.
Making a dowel frame on which to stretch and paint silk
Make this budget frame! Buy four pieces of dowel, about 0.75-1.00 inches across, and about 6-8 inches longer than required (3-4 inches on each end). With masking tape, secure each corner overlapping two pieces of dowel - make secure. You can balance this frame on a table or backs of chairs, and is ideal as an inexpensive frame.
Taking photos of your artwork
Ever considered taking professional photos of your own artwork, but didn't know how? www.artsfortheparks.com/slidetips.html has an excellent list of how to go about it, partly shown below (p.7). For full explicit details, please go to their website.
Here's what you'll need:
- buy two 3200K tungsten flood lamps, 500W or better.
- add light stands.
- add two 18x18 polarizing filters to filter the flood lamps.
- get a nice camera with 100mm macro lens.
- add rigid tripod. You''ll be needing 1- to 8- second time exposures.
- add polarizing filter, preferably helios or B + W brand.
- shoot Fuji 64 T or Kodak T64 tungsten film.
- Always shoot through the polarzing filter.
- You're shooting a polarized light source through a polarized filter. Don't ask, just spin the polarizer and watch through camera. Magic.
Shoot away.
Good luck! Anyone else have tips on photographing artwork? We'd love to hear about it.
Consignment, Contracts
Excellent website with books to buy (or find in your library), so you can be fully armed with all the contracts and info you need to leave work on consignment etc - know your rights.
Go to www.hopcottebooks.com/~art/ap-artbooks/contracts.html
Looking for die-cut cards of all shapes and sizes?
Check out www.papercreations.com
Laminating silk on glass - what an idea!
I heard about this recently - haven't seen it, and might be worth investigating - if anyone is interested in laminating silk onto glass, Liquid
Laminate www.beaconcreates.com seems to work the best. JoSonja's
water-based polyurethane is good as a finish coat. The silk evidently looks
great behind the layers of glass.
Setasilk silk paint
I've seen work done by artists who use Setasilk on their silk, with some stunning and incredible results. To see for yourself, visit Leonard Thompson's website (UK silk artist) www.silkartist.co.uk
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