I saw an interesting technique for hand dyed fabric on a TV show the other day and wanted to try it on paper. The proper technique involves mixing instant potatoes to a gravy consistency and then squirting it on black fabric in random patterns. As the potato dries it cracks and crazes. They sprayed bleach on the dried fabric and then rinsed the potato away, revealing an incredible batik like pattern!
Here is my attempt on paper: I decided to try freezer paper first because it has the wax backing and won't fall apart as easily. Since this is my first attempt I decided to spray on Color Wash in Eggplant. Next time I'm going to dye it first and then spray with bleach. Anyway, I applied the potato thickly on one piece of paper and thinly on the second. Since I have no patience, I stuck them in my oven on the drying setting. They were pretty dry in 30 minutes so I went ahead and sprayed. I dried them to set set the ink with my blow dryer and then rinsed them gently.... and it worked!!!!! The scans lost a lot of the definition, but the sheet with the thicker application turned out perfectly- very batiked looking. The sheet with the thin application is nice too, just very subtle. By the way, the look before removing the potato is very cool too!
Here they are:
Posts
2 comments:
Sue, these are wildly gorgeous. Guess I must put this on my shopping list as well.
Lots of beautiful work on your blog--been too long since I visited!
Sue...Thanks for posting this technique and your results. It does look really cool. I think I even have some instant potatoes leftover in my pantry.
chrissy
Post a Comment