Susie Monday

Artist, maker, teacher, author, head cook and bottlewasher.

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The art I make is the result of a life-long love of pattern, texture and color. How I teach is a skill honed by experience (I started teaching creative arts to younger kids when I was 12). After earning a B.A. in Studio Arts from Trinity University, I helped lead an internationally recognized educational foundation, designed curriculum exhibits for schools and other institutions, wrote and edited for a major daily newspaper, opened the San Antonio Children's Museum and then, a dozen years ago, took the scary but essential (for me) leap to become a fulltime artist and art teacher.

About This Blog

This weblog is about the maker's life. The teacher's path. The stitching and dyeing and printing of the craft of art cloth and art quilt. The stumbling around and the soaring, the way the words and the pictures come together. Poetry on the page and in the piecing of bright scraps together. The inner work and the outer journeys to and from. Practicalities and flights of fancy and fearful grandeur, trivial pursuits and tactile amusements. Expect new postings two or three times a week, unless you hear otherwise. 

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    « Hoping for the Chance to Say THIS | Main | iPad Workshop at the Studio »
    Tuesday
    Mar052013

    Sun Prints Even in Winter?

    My Joggles class this week features Sun Printing letters and text.  (Hint: use refrigerator magnets and foam letters) I love this process and often use the results in my work. This little altar piece above is part of a small series (so far) called Found Text. It's kind of a random improvisational way of working, where I find images and then words or words and then images in my stash, put them together almost like little visual poems. They aren't deep or profound, sometimes they are even whimsical, but they are works that make me happy -- not the least because I am making use of some fragments and bits and pieces that I  really like but that don't seem to fit into anything else I am doing!

    But, I realized that for this online course, here I was suggesting sunprinting at a time when most of us can't use the sun for the results. Now, South Texas yesterday worked; it was about 85 in downtown San Antonio. But today, a Norther is upon us and the temps low, and more importantly, the wind is roaring, no way to keep shadows on a piece of fabric!

    Here's what Pebeo, makers of Setacolor --one of the best  paints to use for this process -- recommends:

    "If the sun is not reliable there are other options. Heat lamps such as those used by restautants", grow lights (I'm sure you have one) and I say, just use those metal work lamps mounted close to your fabric. Don't go off and leave these, any could cause a fire if the bulb fell on the fabric or it got too hot. But you will get the results if the humidity is low. High humidity, too? Better wait until August!

    Some other tips gathered here and there for sunprints:

    Sprinkle the surface with salt

    Use complementary color washes of your thinned out paints

    Rubber band fabric, spray with paints and leave in the sun for an interesting variation of tie dye

     

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    Reader Comments (1)

    I love doing faux sun printing. I don't have a huge lamp to use but have had fairly good results with my desk lamp, of all things! Looks like you all have a great time.
    March 5, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterLisa Chin

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