Backgrounds and Beyond - a workshop in manipulation
Velvet, Vlisofix, Lutradur and Gossemer Fuse
Working with a variety of different fabrics including natural fibres, man made non woven fabrics and material can enhance the background for an textile art quilt.
I have taught a Backgrounds and Beyond workshop introducing textile artist to fibres like Lutradur, Tyvek, Sizoflor, Nappy Liners and plastic as surface for paint and stitch.
The first part of the workshop focuses on mark making, patterning and colouring the different fabrics with paint, crayons, dye and ink then adding stamped and stencilled images and patterns.
Students at a workshop in Renmark decorating canvas with paper
The decorated surfaces can then be manipulated with heat tools including an iron, soldering iron and heat gun.
The non woven fabrics shrink, distort, melt and contort with different kinds of heat application.
Using resists to form specific shapes can also be fun.
Painted and stitched Tyvek
Combining different layers of the created fabrics results in beautiful backgrounds ready for stitch.
painted vlisofix ironed to batting with strips of painted Lutradur in different weights pinned on top.
Finally the created surface are embellished with machine embroidery, hand embroidery, beading and or needle felting.
The same created fabrics can be rolled into beads and zapped with overlays of fusible fibres.
