Fabric/ Paper or Paper/Fabric

My friend Hedi Edinger visited me this week and we made our own vernissage of the studio. We worked for the first time as a "group" in it and tried some new possibilities with fabric and paper.

I always liked to do my "fabric" on which I could work. These last years I tried many combinations of material as a base for further embroidery and embellishment. I wanted to do the pieces more "light" and transparent. Because of that I used mostly cheesecloth, felted of layed on with other materials (all I could find from wool to nappy liners). I also used hemp and loose fibers in between the layers.

Now I read in "Mixed Media Explorations" from Beryl Taylor that she used paper between fabric and tissue paper and bonded everything with PVA glue, so that I decided to give it a try with Hedi.

We took light cotton fabric and layered the other media as described and then painted it with Golden Fluid. This was my first try with Golden Fluid and I must confess that I tried to economize with this paint because of the price of it in Europe an thinking it is just a try, so that I ended with a mudded color I actually didn't want to have but was too avaricious to dump it right away! I told myself everything can be turned to a nice piece if you know how and continue working on it, so that at the end I decided to use the back of the Fabric Paper instead of the front and enjoyed the wonderful "print" that occurred on that side and that looks like a small rose flowers print. The colors are more subdued in the original and I think the photograph doesn't give it much credit...

All worked out fine at the end. The piece is rather stiff, not like my transparent cheesecloth ones, but if offers another range of possibilities. I didn't like hand stitching on it (I mean the feeling of it rather than the outcome that can be great!)

All in all a great technique that I want to explore further, adding or taking something till I feel I can incorporate it to my work.

It's fun, try it!!