A TECHNIQUE DRIVEN Blog dedicated to mastery of surface design techniques. First we dye, overdye, paint, stitch, resist, tie, fold, silk screen, stamp, thermofax, batik, bejewel, stretch, shrink, sprinkle, Smooch, fuse, slice, dice, AND then we set it on fire using a variety of heat tools.

Monday, March 23, 2015

Quality of Line

Lets go back to this wild child.  It is a  wild child for sure.  Here it is washed out.

I was hoping for an exciting piece.  I needed a bold statement line to get that effect.  Now with the bubbling of the thickened dye I got a bit more wild child than I had intended but I like it. It would have been a very different  piece, a Miss Manners piece, if I had chosen a different quality of line.  Not saying that is bad.  Just saying it would have been different.  So lets look at some of wild child's lines.




The fabric was dry (which probably increased the bubbling situation) but I laid all the lines down in one sessions and the lines bled into each other.  Isn't that great here?  Didn't work on other pieces like the IRO inspired pieces but is great for this one.



The washed out wild child was unbalanced.  I had used too many dark colored lines in some places and too little in others.  I needed to balance it.  More lines in its future.  Beth said she got a consistent line by putting the tip of the squirt bottle on the fabric.  I tried it. See that straight line up the middle of the picture? And the navy blue circles?  UGH!  GAG! Good line for somewhere else but it did not fit with the rest of the piece.  The wild child was just not that well-behaved and sedate.


So, worked on stronger lines but I was working on a new layer rather than with all the lines wet and bleeding into each.  See the difference? The new line doesn't play as nicely with the others.  But it is worth noting that it is more distinct.  Good to know for the future.


I had great fun with the wild child.  It took me three dye sessions to get her finished but so what.  Rome wasn't built in a day.  And I learned a lot about drawing lines with thickened dye.

Brought to you by Judith.

9 comments:

  1. Honestly, I LIKE it.....and if you didn't point out that the uneveness in the lines weren't intentional......one would accept and admire the quirkiness of the piece without question.

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  2. This piece is spectacular - even more so in person. Took my breath away!

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  3. WOW! I really like wild child!!!

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  4. Awesome! I am very inspired by this... free, definitely wild and colorful, and even if the lines didn't come out as you had planned or hoped, they are great! Thanks, Judith!

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  5. I still like it. It really does remind me of the Aboriginal art I loved on a trip to Australia.

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  6. I love the more organic and less stylized nature of this piece. It looks more serendipitous and less planned--an effect of which I am particularly fond. It is a "makes-me-smile" piece.

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  7. I love the line quality. I hope you always get some bleed - that is the exciting part, for me, of looking at your lines. Yes to what Quilter Beth said. It looks serendipitous - as do your IMO experiments. The trick is not losing that spontaneity, once we get more skilled!

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  8. Your work is wonderful, Judith! I just scored a nice hair dye bottle and I can't wait to try it out. Do you have any tips about your dye consistency?

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