As promised …

here are some of my photos from the Kim Thittichai workshop at college yesterday.

We started with painted Bondaweb. Not new to most creative embroiderers, but as several of my fellow students have backgrounds in other forms of needlework, those of us who had done it before were in the minority. But I think it is always good to revisit an old technique.

Kim uses Colourcraft Aztec paints,  amongst other colouring agents – and when I saw the result I decided I needed to get mine out more often.  [Zone Alarm has a pop up which warns me if it doesn’t like a particular website – but it doesn’t warn me about websites where I could end up spending an inordinate amount of money. Like Colourcraft …]

So this is Bondaweb [or ‘bondage’, as the spell-check would have it] painted with Aztec paints, ironed onto cotton, with added glitter, sequins or feathers. [I don’t think teacher approved of the feathers, but I like them, although I can’t see myself ever doing anything with them!]

Then there was Tyvek – fun to play with, but not something I’m very fond of. Better when it’s foiled – especially very well foiled. [The pieces on the right are much smaller than they appear relative to the others, due to the magic of Picasa. The smallest is about the size of a finger nail.]

And finally – and best of all – Lutradur – which is one of those things I’ve bought and never used.  Kim paints it with Procion dye, although as it’s not a natural fibre, the colour dries very subtle. The piece on the left was cut with a heat gun, on the right with a soldering iron.

A fun day – but tiring - I slept much better than normal last night!

Here are the next two pages from the C&G sketchbook. On the right is a colour matching exercise using paint [on the right] and coloured paper] on the left.

The left hand page shows the Kandinsky flowers from yesterday, through the holes. JP asked how I made them – so here’s a close up. Of course when I took the photo I remembered that only one of them is felt – the top one  - all the others are magazine pages. Just circles with slices cut out, layered.

I may not post tomorrow – or over the weekend - as we have visitors. Babybel is coming to help her granddad celebrate his birthday. I just hope he’s up to it …