A sneak peek... (or is it a tease?)

It's with a sigh of both satisfaction and relief that I can finally say...I'm FINISHED!!Chapter 2 of my part in the Pulp Redux Collaboration is done. I've been sewing, sewing and sewing these last few days. Every time I thought I was finished something else would show itself, something that had to be there, something that belonged. They say that ignorance is bliss, I often told myself the same thing over the last few months that I have spent on these pages. Usually when I'd decided to do 'just one more thing' and then quickly realised that 'one more thing' was leading to just one more...but that is the way it is with creativity. With flow. With ambition. I really wanted to push myself with these pages. Working in fabric, bead making, dying with onion skins and making dye from a nest. All new things to me. I was so in awe of Lisa J's work that I wanted to honour her art and her theme by giving it my all and despite the sore fingers I've loved doing it! As it so often happens when you push yourself you find that there is a little more there, a lesson learnt and a new self discovery to be made. The rewards are big!
So without further ado...and before it starts to sound like I am accepting an Emmy,lol, here's a sneaky peek at how the finished pages look.

End view of the closed (not litteraly!) book. The book is made from a vintage photo album. The top half of the photo shows Lisa's work. I love how they mingle as one.

The side views. Delicious layers of fibre and thread! The wooden part on the top is Lisa's work, she used parts of a cuckoo clock. How clever is that??

Please click Lisa's blog link and the Pulp Redux link in my side bar to see what else has been going on in the Pulp Universe!

Pretty much everything you see here was either found, gifted to me or bought in a second hand shop.

I'm not even sure what the red disc below is...I found it on the floor while vacumning!

I love how the lace below used to be someone elses net curtains...they look like they were made for this book!

Found roofing nail caps and 'pearls' from Spain. A beautiful partnership! I recieved a broken pearl necklace from the artist that I did my first ever AB swap with. They're here to represent Lisa's Grandmother ( I will explain that later!) The thick string is the only new ingrediant I bought in this whole spread. Gotta love recycling!

That adorable heart was sent to me by Danit (from NZ mail art) I only recieved it yesterday...who knew I needed that? Love it when it works out like that! She gave me a whole bunch of other cool things too and one of her own collages. Thanks Danit!

And just one more.....

Would you believe that's not even all of the photos I took?

Watch this space for the next post, I will reveal all soon!

ICE 2010 #4 On loan

International Collage Exchange 2010
Series: Chain Reaction
Title: On loan

Teasel lino cut on coffee dyed paper,teasel ofcut on painted paper, hand made paper, library issue pocket, paper clips, thread, brads.

'On loan' reflects my belief that this earth is not ours. We are a part of this earth and it is part of us, we do not own it, it is simply ours to enjoy while we are here. In keeping with my chain reaction theme I am making reference to the fact that what we do here set's in place a chain reaction that alters the environment that we leave for future generations.
I have enjoyed making this, I was challenging myself to create something that was different yet not to different from what I usually do. For now what I am doing is really working for me but I don't want to get to comfortable in it! Sometimes when I try to make a change from what I normally do I don't end up liking what I have done, it dosn't reflect me and I find it uncomfortable. Not so this time, I think there is enough of my regular elements and colours for me to still feel like this is...me and that is a good feeling!

Marigold dye

We decided to give the marigold dye a go as you can see! (By we I mean the kids and I as they are home from school for the holidays. )I picked 20 or so big marigold flowers and the kids pulled them apart. We put the green bits to the side as we wanted to make orange dye not brown:)
I pour about 750 mls of boiling water over the petals (enough to cover the mix but hopefully not over dilute the mix!) and my daugther gives it all a stir. I took some samples of the water at 5mins to see what the colour was like and then again after 1.5hours. To my suprise there was no difference. The marigolds smell was all over our hands but the smell of the water was not very 'marigoldy' at all. I was suprised at that too.

The petals soaked for about 3.5 hours for no other reason than I didn't want to heat up the element just to boil the petals. I waited till I already had the element hot and then gave them an hour. The resulting pulp was less than 1/2 a cup and the resulting dye was a dirty orange.

I figured it would settle though so left it over night to do just that.

In the morning the mix had settled but some of the particles had suspended themselves in a sort of cloudy gel in the mix.(Which you can see below) I'm not sure what caused this but I would need to strain the dye through a cheese-cloth to get rid of the remaining sediment.

I have taken some samples of the mix to test the strength and it's 2x as strong as it was prior to being boiled although a definate yellow with a green base and not an orange. I will be having a play around painting with the dye tomorrow so hopefully I will get some nice results!