Summer Erosion Bundle 2017

October 11, 2017 Evelyn34 Comments

Back in the summer I did a post documenting how I made my latest erosion bundles, you can read about it here. They’ve been in the garden for almost 2 1/2 months. Well, a few days ago I opened them up, carefully separated everything and left my papers and fabrics to dry….

Lots of rust and berry stains….

The lovely blue/mauve stains above and below are from blackberries….

It will come as no surprise that fabrics made from natural fibres (ie. cotton, silk, linen etc.) absorb colour and stains much better than synthetic fabrics. Below are two pieces of blackberry and rust stained silk….

All paper fragments, like the ones above, are kept and will be used in a future art project…

Pearl mica adds some shimmer on the papers below….

Beautiful rust stains below….

Above and below are both sides of the same piece. They’re actually two pieces of paper fused together, there’s just no hope of separating them. The rust stains are gorgeous. Some rusty washers are still attached. Below you can see some eye shadow and berry marks too. But what really intrigues me though is that round turquoise circle you can see on both sides of the paper. As yet, I have no idea what made that turquoise circle – it’s distinctly washer shaped, so I’m thinking that maybe one of my washers has reacted with something in my bundle. That’s one of the joys of erosion bundles ~ lovely things happen inside them ~ you never know what you’re going to find when you open them….

Below is some greaseproof paper from the kitchen – it’s quite good stuff to put into an erosion bundle, not too thick and fairly strong. There’s a dried blueberry stuck on it and you can also see some blackberry stains. In the middle on the right you can also see a pattern left by some fabric….

Below is a piece of bleached denim, it always stains well in an erosion bundle…

Below is some rusty jute….

So these are the results of my summer erosion bundles. I didn’t photograph everything, just the most interesting bits. I’ll have to start thinking about what to do for my next bundle. All these lovely papers and fabrics are going to be carefully stored till I need them. I’m hoping to use them in a new project next year – but more information about that later this year.

Erosion Bundles

Spring Erosion Bundle 2017 – Fabrics

July 2, 2017July 2, 2017 Evelyn19 Comments

Here are the fabric results from my spring erosion bundle. I posted the paper results about 2 weeks ago – you can see them HERE. I’m quite pleased with how the fabrics turned out….

A piece of lacy fabric has been given a vintage make over in my erosion bundle with the aid of some rusty items and pale blue paint…

Here’s a slightly closer view of the rusty section, looking beautifully vintage….

Above is part of an armchair arm cover. I has some lovely rust stains on it, plus paint and paper for added texture. Here’s a closer view…

You can see the paint and paper stuck to the fabric – they are completely fused together…

Above we have some more very vintage looking lace pieces, stained by rust and teabags….

Paint and tea stained cotton….

Gentle rust and dark blue paint stains on some silk…

More lovely rust stains from some washers and other items…..

Next we have a series of bleach washed denim. I soaked the denim in bleach, rinsed and dried it prior to putting it into my erosion bundle

My fabrics will be carefully stored till I am ready to use them in my art work. In the meantime I’m deciding what to put into my summer erosion bundle. I’m going for a different colour scheme and using other things I’ve never tried before. I’m hoping to get it into the garden before the end of the month….

Erosion Bundles

Spring Erosion Bundle 2017 – Papers

June 20, 2017June 26, 2017 Evelyn46 Comments

Way back in early March I put an erosion bundle into the garden. What is an erosion bundle? Very simply, it’s a pile of papers and fabrics assembled in layers with lots if interesting things in between the layers that will leave marks or stains. You can use natural or man made things to create the stains or marks – the key is to experiment! The bundle is then tied with string and placed outside and left at the mercy of the elements till it’s suitably decayed, about 2 -3 months, but times can vary considerably.

So without any more waffle, here’s my results:

I worked on a blue and rust theme with this bundle. Sometimes the papers break up when trying to separate them but I keep all the fragments – everything will get used…

Above we have several layers of paper, paint, fabric and foil all completely fused together – there’s no way of separating them! But we have some lovely colours and textures…

I like putting paper doilies in my bundles but they are very delicate and rarely stay in one piece. On the one above you can see marks left from rusty washers…

Above we have several layers of paper, fabric and paint fused together by the elements. I think there’s a teabag in the layers somewhere – I can feel it but there’s no way of getting it out, it will have to stay there! Notice the lovely pastel colours and gentle rust and tea stains….

In the piece above there are rusty washers stuck to the paper – I can’t get them off! The background paper was a piece of “test paper” I used for testing colours on before they go on my art work…

Beautiful shades of blue and hints of rust…

A question I’m frequently asked about my erosion bundles is “what are you going to do with these papers and fabrics?”. The answer: they will get used in mixed media art work and collage. But more specifically, my sister Carolyn and I are going to begin a new art project early next year and my erosion bundle papers and fabrics are going to be enormously useful for that. I will give more information about this new project later in the year – it’s exciting… !

I hope you enjoyed looking at my distressed papers. There will be a second post about my spring erosion bundle which will focus on the fabrics that came out of my spring erosion bundle – they are just lovely and inspiring….

Surface Treatment Workshop

Surface Treatment Workshop – Week 13

June 7, 2017June 16, 2017 Evelyn30 Comments

Today sees a return to the Surface Treatment Workshop after a few weeks break for my holiday and time for me to recover from a rather unpleasant injury. Week 13 is about using pastes. I used Galeria Modelling Paste. Here’s what I did with it…

Pastes are very good for embedding objects into your art work. Above, after applying my paste (not too thinly) I pressed some papers, cardboard and some rusty washers into the paste. The washers were quite chunky and heavy but the paste did a great job of sticking them down. I then simply applied a thin wash of pale blue acrylic paint over the paste.

In the above sample, after applying the paste I embedded some papers and then I used a number of different things to make marks in the paste around the paper. I used a round cardboard tube and some bubble wrap. When the paste was dry I painted over the paste with pale blue and turquoise paint and highlighted some of the marks in the paste with gel pens.

Pastes are very good for embossing patterns into. Above I applied my paste to some thick paper and then pressed some swirly shapes into the paste. When it had dried I painted the shapes with blue, gold and turquoise acrylic paint.

Below is another similar sample:

I simply applied a pale turquoise acrylic paint to this one. These shapes turned out quite well.

So then to sum up my findings for this weeks workshop I would say pastes are a very useful commodity to have among my art supplies. I don’t think I will be using huge amounts of it but it will come in handy on occasions and it is very easy to use – does what it says on the tin… ! As always, these samples will be stuck into my dedicated STW sketchbook!

Next weeks Surface Treatment Workshop is about skins – this could turn out quite interesting. Looking forward to it…

Photography

Colour Inspiration

April 9, 2017April 16, 2017 Evelyn15 Comments

These are the colours that are inspiring me today ~ turquoise, aqua, and cyan ~ colours on a sea worn boat in the harbour….

Above we have some bleached dark indigo denim (dark indigo denim doesn’t bleach white, it goes a dark cream colour that you see above) along with some cotton dyed with cerulean blue acrylic paint and some rusty stuff.

They’re colours that complement each other so well. Underneath the image I used Photoshop to “paint” colour samples with colours extracted from the image. In real painting terms the colours I see in the image are Indigo, Cerulean Blue, Buff Titanium and Burnt Sienna ~ a beautiful inspiring combination….

I may have a play with these colours later this evening….

Photography

Indigo & Rust

April 3, 2017April 12, 2017 Evelyn6 Comments

Denim & Rust - NB

At the weekend I decided to have a little play with some light blue denim and some bleach. I just love the wonderful shades of indigo blue that denim comes in – they’re all very different.

Also a new crop of rusty stuff is “developing” in my garden! The piece of rust above is one of four new pieces recently rusted. I also have a lovely collection of washers and nuts happily gaining a nice thick rusty coat in my garden at the moment….

Rusting Washers - NB

They’re not properly “cooked” yet – these washers will be in my garden for at least another week yet. I’m so looking forward to putting some of these into my erosion bundles and other art work when they’re done!

Tag: washers

Summer Erosion Bundle 2017

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Spring Erosion Bundle 2017 – Papers

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Surface Treatment Workshop – Week 13

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Indigo & Rust

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