Experiments - printing on fabric

Looking back over my goals for 2019  I noticed I had written once again - print on fabric.  So before 2019 was farewelled, I wanted to give it a shot, rather than roll it over for yet another year.

I wanted to do letterpress printing on fabric in particular, so went around the interweb to see how people did it - with very limited success.  So I googled a bit more and found a few people who I thought might know how to do it.  I emailed them and got replies from nearly everybody which was very kind and very helpful.

And so I decide to do some tests and some trials with the inks I had to hand.

I really wanted to find out if the rubber-based inks I use for most of my letterpress would print on fabric.  Nobody I contacted had ever done it, so there was a challenge!  I also wanted to test the Permaset Aqua inks which folk tend to use for screen printing; and I also had a go with some of the Golden Open Acrylics just in case.

I was working with a white 50% cotton-50% linen mix fabric (and some calico for trials as well).

First up, some wood type went onto the bed of our new proofing press. Held in place with magnets.

The results of the printing.  The calico strip in the middle has them all; the four white rectangles have one each.

The orange is a rubber-based ink, the black is Permaset Aqua and the red is Golden Open Acrylic. Here they all are drying in the sun in the gravel at the back of the studio (weighed down so as not to blow away).

On the calico - the rubber based ink was crisp and printed beautifully.

The Permaset Aqua applied using a foam roller  was bit blotchy and didn't cover as well.

So I tried it with a small rubber roller which slipped and slid all over the shop but created a rather painterly look.

On the calico I applied the Golden Open Acrylic with the rubber roller. And I used a small foam roller on the piece of white line/cotton.

First up you have to dry them.  The rubber based ink dries by absorption - so it has to seep into the fabric.  The others dry by evaporation and will disappear into the air to dry.  It has been hot and dry and so they worked pretty well.

After drying you have to 'cure' the ink by ironing. Which I dutifully did.  I knew at this point that the orange rubber based ink wasn't really dry like the others, but decided to wash the calico strip anyway just to confirm my understanding.

And I was right - it bled and made a lovely orange backdrop to the calico. Lovely, but not the look we were going for.

All the others held well after washing.

And so I let the orange on linen/cotton dry for a week.  It sat in the sun some days, it sat inside, I forgot about it and decided that I would probably have the patience to let something sit for a week, so it was now or never - if it worked it worked if it didn't then I had to find an alternative to rubber based inks.

Yay it worked.  I ironed it then washed it and it came out fine.

Here it is crisp and clean but apologies for the odd coloured background - it is a beautiful white still. The shudder judder mark was me messing up the actual print, not a result of the washing.

And so I have written down all my notes, and marked each one with a sharpie as the notes refer to it so I should always remember what I did and what I might do.

I then went and washed the orange on the linen/cotton again just to make sure and it came out good as gold so I think I have the whole drying/curing thing right. Phew.

Now what to print?!?!?!?

Thursday Thoughts...

“What we can or cannot do, what we consider possible or impossible, is rarely a function of our true capability. It is more likely a function of our beliefs about who we are.” 

Albert Camus

I imagine that this quote could pertain to two of my three rotating topics - life and art; but today I am pondering art so about art it shall be.

There is a certain truth isn't there in trying to understand how we limit ourselves; how powerfully our brain can direct and or limit our pursuits. And I think creatively we are often blocked by whatever odd little stories we tell ourselves about something; or about ourselves.

Whether or not we can do that, are good enough to, know what we're doing or should be doing something else.  All are stories we tell ourselves along the way at times.

Who know what we could do if we didn't tell ourselves a story but rather asked ourselves the questions what if or why not?

I pushed myself so many times when working with Susan on our Pas de Deux collaboration...

Ode to Stones

So, I got my act together and managed to complete this Variable Edition of 5 books.

I had wanted to test and try a range of things when I began, so the books are on different papers, with different surface treatments and are different sizes.  In the end one of them has a completely different finished look as well.

All I know is that I know a whole lot more about letterpress and making now, than I did when I began making these more than 18 months ago.

I dismantled the ones I had stitched and prepared earlier because they were so flimsy.  I had tried to rescue them a few times with different approaches, but in the end all the covers were binned.

See what I mean by flimsy? An overhead shot of the spine with it nicely held at the tail but way too much play in between. To this day I don't know what I was thinking...

A couple of the earlier covers, ready for binning.

And the first look at one of the finished ones.

I prepared a firm-soft cover in Magnani Pescia Grey to act as a wrap around cover.

I unpicked all the stitching on all five books and started again - this time with a simple coptic stitch holding the book block together.

I stitched in a fly leaf both front and back and these slip under the inside fold of the cover to hold the book block in place.

 And so to the words and printing.

The books are all about stone circles  or standing stones which we love to visit and discover when in Scotland.  They are majestic and powerful and I really feel their strength and presence.

I did some naive type lino prints of different circles, wrote some words, sorted out the layout and printed the lino then the letterpress.

This one is on cream BFK Rives paper.

 You can see here how the fly leaves slip within the fold of the cover.

Four of the Variable Edition of 5 - the long tall one is Gmund Cotton 300gsm covered in book cloth to try something new and different.

The two tall ones have Grey Pescia paper for pages with some marks on the paper.

The fifth in the edition where I just taped the sides together to create a simpler journal sketch book kind of thing. Also nice in its own way, with grey rolled ink as the background.

 So many learnings, so many steps forward then backwards, but before the year is out they are complete!

Little bits of making

So I have been trying to commit to more time in the studio - to engage more actively with my making; to try and have it become a bigger part of my everyday.

I have been tidying up the studio space as well as my sewing room and I am interested to discover just how much I am gripped by enthusiasm for the possibilities that now await, rather than responding to the sense of chaos and unfinished business everywhere.

Observing your own life at times can be intriguing.

So studio time this week has seen me testing and trialling some printing on fabrics; trying a wee lino cut for the first time in ages; picking up some books that had defeated me for 18 months and finding new paths forward; and stitching together a small pamphlet book for my sewing group.

Small successes.

I had thought it would be fun to try and do a small (7cm x 7cm) lino print of the cottage in Scotland. And so I reduced a photo to black and white, traced it and transferred it onto a 10cm x 10cm piece of lino.

And then began to carve. Enthusiastically I dug out bits in the sky, and then tried to work my way around the small details of the cottage, the fences, the washing line. the gables, the door, the stonework...

What was I thinking?!?!  Not the easiest of things to attempt after years of not doing it, but hey.

I did a quick ink, masking off with some tape I had recovered from around some tubs of ink.

And realised that I had clearly cut our bits that should have stayed, but this was a beginning and I didn't beat myself up.

I pulled a couple of prints and smiled.

So many learnings from that small and quick process. I think in part because I had started something just for the fun of it, that I had worked out a few tricks for myself, and that nobody was invested in it I could really look at it clearly and work out what I liked and what I would do differently.

It feels surprisingly good to have printed something that doesn't work, yet offers so much potential.

And then it was back to the books that hadn't worked out 18 months ago. So many things were tricky with them and the documented process is full of ups and downs and roundabouts from way back when...

I said to Barry it felt as if they had been sitting there for that long quietly criticising me. It was a fairly negative conversation so I was interested to see that I suddenly wanted to pick them up and do something with them; that in fact I thought I might have worked out what to do to rescue them.

I had been stuck with the covers.  For whatever reason way back then I just hadn't thought through how I would attach the pages and the cover and they had ended up being totally loose and flimsy and I must say, rather awful and rather disappointing. So they sat there in their flimsy, weakened state for over a year.

I tested the idea of a cover, and then thought to make it better I could emboss something so pulled out the lino I had carved for the pages and tried to emboss/deboss it.  Interesting result but not what I had hoped for.  However, the trials remain in the ether as options in the future for something...

And then to my wee pamphlet stitched book.

My sewing class is finishing up next week forever, which makes me sad, yet grateful for the amazing time we have had and the many many things I have learned and made.  A few weeks ago I thought to go early on a couple of occasions and sit with Narelle (seamstress extraordinaire) and get her to to tell me some of the things she knows and which she says in class but which we always forget.

I wrote them down and typed them up.  I could have just printed them on A4 paper, stapled them and shared them around with everybody; or simply emailed them through to people, but I thought they deserved a little bit more and created a booklet in Word, then printed them onto 150gsm paper, creased them, pierced them and sewed them with a pamphlet stitch.

They look and feel nice and will be a nice memento (and a useful one I hope) for all of us as we head off to be independent sewers (eek).

A few tips and tricks for those of us who will forget - like which direction to press your seams; the sewing sequence for pants; how to do french seams and so on.

As ever, spines and stitching, I  love.

Its fun to realise just how much I have enjoyed no major achievements, some resolutions and some fun exploration and learning.

Thursday Thoughts...

“For a while there I read mostly poetry, which seemed to ratify or at least dignify my outsized feelings”.

Nam Le

Reflecting back on his teenage years here, it feels to me like a lovely description of what to do with outsized feelings!  I even think its nice that he calls them outsized, rather than oversized feelings - it adds that sense of things just not fitting when you are younger and don't quite know what to do with them.

Anyhow, it is also a lovely way of saying how poetry can just fit.  Oftentimes I think poetry is a place where you can find what you need, when you need it and sometimes without even knowing that you needed it.

Poetry is so vast and so various, and yet mostly it's available and easy to get into.  You can flick through a book of poems and find out fairly quickly if they are for you or not.

Sometimes there will only be one or two which grab you - but my goodness do they grab.  They speak right to you, personally, and they help makes sense of your world.

And just for that moment you can sit with them and feel heard.

Reviving a commission

Several years ago I was asked to print a small wall piece as a farewell gift for the Chairperson of a Board.  A week or so ago I was asked to do another one - along the same lines, for another farewell.

I went back and tried to find photographs and other details of the work I had done but there didn't seem to be a lot around.

Eventually I found a proof which was a big help.

And so I set about replicating it. And it was slightly trickier than I had thought it might be; and I was grateful I had kept some pretty good notes.

So I went and found all the type - the different typefaces and the sizes, as well as quite a few spaces.

I measured the width of each line on the proof and worked out what I was aiming at - but it took several goes to get the spacing right.

My first carbon paper proof against the older work, and I realised that I must have left the metal furniture out between the lines of type in the original, as the text there was tighter.

At this point I wished I had taken a photo of the locked up chase previously so I would know for sure.

Note to self...

Here is the photo this time with the interlinear metal furniture.

Did I prefer the loose or the tight look? I inked it up and compared.

And went with the tighter look.

Here is the photo with the the interlinear metal furniture removed! Just in case there is a next time.

May I say those plastic tweezers are so helpful when lifting small bits of metal away from small type and trying desperately not to have the whole block tip over and scatter!

Inking was fun.  After proofing with black I thought it would be nice to go with one of the greens that form part of the organisation's logo.

I had done some calligraphic work for them previously with the green and it  had been well received.
And so to colour-mixing. A little bit of this and a little bit of that.

Because it is only the larger typeface that gets inked in colour I tried to make sure the ink didn't bleed onto the lines above and below.

Sticky taped paper barely works in case you ever need to know.

However, this non stick painter's tape is a dream to work with and goes on and off easily and doesn't move once in place. Another note to self.

Inked up and no bleed...

Testing the colour mix to the logo and deciding that it works fine.

And then ta da as they say in the classics.  A couple of prints that worked. One to the framers and two just to send in case they want to use them again as gifts in the future.

In case you are wondering.  The organisation (McAuley Community Services) provides services to homeless women.  They have four guiding principles: compassion, justice, community and hospitality.

Working with the CEO, we determined that the first three lines - family violence, women and homelessness are experienced, then their interaction with McAuley (justice) enables them to afterwards experience safety, home, wellbeing and a sense of feeling brave.

You may recall the work I did for their new building around the meditation and reflection room, and the life fragments...

It is always an honour to work with this organisation.