Making Something from Nothing

I love it when I can find a use for a fabric I never expected to use - like a cloth used to scrub down ink prior to its intended application (Fig. 1).  Just such a cloth was used on my latest project, Brushstrokes.  I found a piece that had random scrubbed ink marks on the lower half and a large white space above it.  I was able to rough-in trees and a sky in the top half using watered down acrylic paint before laying dyed scrim over the lower half.  The scrubbed-ink below the scrim then served as the under-painting. I continued the layering up process to the final design by adding dyed scrim, fabric bits and small pearl beads to the trees and fabric bits and thread trash to enhance the scrim landscape.  Quilting fleshed out the lay of the land and contributed to the overall texture of the work. Simple children's buttons were the sheep on the hillside.  A name tag on the front instead of the back completed the final design. Yarns were couched down the sides and across the top/bottom then braided to finish the edge (Fig. 2).

 Scrubbed Ink on Cotton                      Fig. 1

 

 

 

Brushstrokes                                               16" x 20"

                                                                          Fig. 2