A Fresh Palette

So I went to begin drawing on my paper quilts this week, when I realized I wasn't quite ready for them. I needed to do some experiments first, to see what extra depth I could add to my drawings, and decided to have some fun painting paper with tea, wine, and lemon juice. I spent about 3 hours on these experiments, and the results were quite intriguing.

My paint palette: red wine, raspberry flavored tea, and black tea.

Above is some finished product, hanging to dry on my makeshift laundry line. The purple on the left is red wine, the brown is lemon juice (ironed so the heat would brown it), and the right most piece is a combination of all four paints.

This piece above particularly intrigued me: it is a combination of black tea and lemon juice. The piece was originally just black tea, but when I accidentally dripped some lemon juice on the tea, I noticed it was acting as a natural bleach. I couldn't resist playing with that to see what would happen. I really need to start drawing on these scraps now to see what happens. This weekend/next week, for sure.

In addition to my experiments and preparing for the review next week, I spent a good 6 hours on this drawing. Slow going, but yesterday, after much frustration, I think I broke some ground. There is still a lot of work to do, which I intend to continue this week and into break, but I feel there is progress being made.

As for this coming week, preparation for critique all around! And some drawing, if I can find the time. Finals week, you know? Fingers crossed I survive!

Needles and Pins

My fingers are sore after this past week, but contrary to what you might think, I am quite enjoying the itty bit of pain on account of all the productivity it represents. I completed sewing two large paper quilts of sorts on which I will be drawing all of next week (hence the sore fingers...handsewing is brutal!). If I were to tally the hours, I'd say it would be at least 10 spent sewing. Yeah. Who's the smart one who thought hand-sewn paper would be a good idea? Oh wait, that's me.

But enough complaining, I quite like the effect. I'm interested to see how some drawing will work on/with/against the sewing, and to see whether I prefer the more organic, unplanned piece or the more map-like, gridded, though still somewhat loose piece. Or maybe both will be in order. It's hard to say at this point.

I also spent a couple of hours working on the following drawing, here are some snapshots of the progress:

But once again, the upcoming week will be busy, busy, busy. Much time will be dedicated to drawing, in addition to preparations for Midterm Consultations. I'm thinking it will be a powerpoint making, outline memorizing, speech practicing bonanza. Talk about a party.