Ring around the Renga
You may remember that I told you about our fiber art group's Renga exercise with surface design here. This week I added the fourth, and final, layer to another member's fabric. It started off as a hand dye with lime green and acid yellow (not really evident with the icky lighting here). The second layer was made of randomly strewn blue lines created by a rubbing; the third layer comprised of more randomly strewn lines made from Lumiere metallic paints painted over shibori stitched lines (the stitches were removed after painting).
I thought the lines evoked a feeling of the ocean and seaweed flowing in the currents; however, they were also pretty spread out across the fabric. I felt the fabric needed some sort of overall element, so I cut a random design from wax paper and ironed it to the surface,
then sponge painted over the stencil with lavender (the irony of using a sponge on a sea-like fabric wasn't lost on me),
and, viola! here's the fabric after four different surface design processes.
We shared all the fabrics at last night's meeting and it was fun to see all the creative ways people met the challenge. If you're looking for something fun to do with friends that's relatively easy, but more challenging than you'd think, this might be a good idea.
I thought the lines evoked a feeling of the ocean and seaweed flowing in the currents; however, they were also pretty spread out across the fabric. I felt the fabric needed some sort of overall element, so I cut a random design from wax paper and ironed it to the surface,
then sponge painted over the stencil with lavender (the irony of using a sponge on a sea-like fabric wasn't lost on me),
and, viola! here's the fabric after four different surface design processes.
We shared all the fabrics at last night's meeting and it was fun to see all the creative ways people met the challenge. If you're looking for something fun to do with friends that's relatively easy, but more challenging than you'd think, this might be a good idea.
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