At the beginning of each new year, it always seems that one has more time…maybe its the deescalation from the frantic holidays…or cocooning inside, safe from inclement weather…whatever the reason, I found I had time to explore a few ideas that had been knocking around in my brain.

I wanted to break out of my art routine and try something new…getting away from the tried and true. I’ve been wanting to incorporate more textiles into my art and thought I would experiment with two different mediums.

The first project involved making a mini-journal out of fabric with a cardboard base and leftover paper scraps. I was intrigued with the idea of using fabric in a journal since discovering the work of Tina Jensen, an artist who lives in Denmark. I was lucky enough to attend one of Tina’s workshops in September 2018 and saw firsthand her detailed creations. I jumped into this project and played with the fabric and papers until I pulled together a small booklet.

I kept the fabric edges raw and the paper edges torn, wanting a loose, free-form look. I used both machine stitching and matte medium in its construction. I made three signatures that I bound together with the cover using simple hand-stitching. There’s plenty of blank pages if I ever feel the need to write or draw inside.

My second project was making containers out of cheesecloth. I had seen an example of this years ago on Instagram but to no avail could not find any instructions on how I might proceed no matter what combination of phrases I typed into Google…so I was on my own.

I started with soaking the cheesecloth in water, molding it around a glass bowl and painting a thick layer of heavy body gel medium over it. Once that was dry on the outside, I painted the inside. That didn’t seem to give the cheesecloth enough stiffness…so I mixed up a small batch of plaster of paris and repeated the process. This back and forth process went on for days…trying different combinations of water and plaster, water and gel medium, different containers to use as forms, different thicknesses of cheesecloth, etc., etc., etc…

Finally I was left with these three containers…

The bowl on the left is just cheesecloth with gel medium…its not very rigid…I may weave some thin wire into it for more strength. The container in the back was made with mostly plaster of paris…the plaster cracked off in several areas and looked a mess…I decoupaged tissue on both the inside and outside to improve its looks…and cut along the top for a more uniform edge.

The bowl on the right probably was my best effort. The glass bowl that I used as a form had a good shape which translated into a nice finished bowl. Again I used bits of a vintage map to decoupage a section of the outside and inside of the bowl to give it visual interest and more rigidity.

What did I learn from all of this…

That it’s really worthwhile to reach outside of your comfort zone every now and again. I didn’t have a plan…nor a deadline…nor an expectation of what the end result would be. I just jumped in and played.

I wasn’t thrilled with the fabric journal so I’ll explore other ways to use fabric in my work. The cheesecloth bowls have possibilities…someone suggested to me to use liquid starch as a molding agent…maybe I’ll dye the cheesecloth first…

I recently purchased 12 of these vintage wood trays…can’t explain it…they just spoke to me. I’m thinking of creating a small vignette inside each tray…possibly a series of some kind…I’ll just have to begin…and see where my creativity takes me.

Want to come and play with me? I’m teaching two back to back workshops in Portland in late April - Scrap Collages and Junk Queen Crowns. Kelli at K.MARIE is the host…and you can find all the details on my CALENDER page…

Meanwhile, I hope you try something new…something you might be a little apprehensive about…you might surprise yourself…