More Deconstructed Screen Printing

I brought out the screens to try DSP again. I made up a couple of screens and let them dry, while waiting I decided to use stencils on the back of another screen to print previously dyed fabrics.



Using the screen of the of the swirly stencil, I let that dry also for DSP. Remembering to stop printing before the whole design was wasted from the screen, I started to print. I used rubber bands, crinkled saran wrap and sequin waste.

This screen was bubble wrap and hair clips.

This one I used black dye in an extruder and drew flowers and leaves.

The end of the flowers and the stencil screen.

These turned out better than my first try, but I still need more imagination in layering items under the screens.

A couple of days later I dyed gradations of yellow/orange, blue/green, and blue/violet. I used different sets of dye mixtures to get clear colors and muted colors. (Used Linda Johansen's book "Fabric Dyer's Dictionary"). This book is a great resource for dye recipes that can be duplicated with same results every time.

The first set of fabrics are yellow/oranges. On the left is clear using lemon yellow and fushia, on the right is muted using golden yellow and chinese red.

The second set of fabrics are blue/green. On the left is clear using turquoise and lemon yellow, on the right is muted using cobalt blue and golden yellow.

The last set of fabrics is blue/violets. On the left is clear using turquoise and fushia, on the right is muted using cobalt blue and chinese red.

I got a good range of values of clear and muted colors. I have a tendency to lean towards the muted colors, but know that the clear values will come in handy.

The last fabric was a fabric I pre-soaked in soda ash water, laid it out on a plastic covered foam board and squirted muted blue/green and muted yellow/orange dye onto the fabric and let dry in the sun. This will be a great fabric to tie into a triatic color scheme of blue/green, yellow/orange, and red/violet.

My next project is to overdye some of these fabrics.

Come back to see how they come out.

Deconstructed Screen Printing

I've been dyeing fabric the past couple weeks but haven't had the chance to take pictures or blog about it till now.

I started off by cleaning the garage and giving myself some space to do wet work. It's not the ideal studio but it sure beats working outside in the hot sun. Hopefully, soon, my brother will install a sink for me.

When my space was set up I got to work. I've wanted to try Deconstructed Screen Printing (DSP) since I got Kerr Grabowski's video. My attempts are very simplistic, but hey, you got to start somewhere.

As I was screening, I realized that I should have stopped with each screen much sooner than I did. My dyes on the screens didn't last anywhere near as long as Kerr's did.

I then used a window from an old screen door (it's amazing the things you find when you clean) to do monoprinting. Using up some of the leftover thickened dyes, I spread some across the window then used a notched scraper and made quarter circles with it. This was later overdyed with a yellow/orange dye mix.

The second one I used my fingers to make the design. This still needs to be overdyed but here's the picture.

All of these were cured overnight in plastic sheeting.

A few days later I did some low-water immersion dyeing using a couple recipes from the blog Fabric Dyeing 101 (www.fabricdyeing101.blogspot.com). If you haven't been to this website its worth the look. I used some white with black fabrics for added interest.

I started with "Rainbow Light" series using scarlet, lemon yellow and sky blue. Most of them came out how you'd expect except the top 3. Really loved those colors.

I also tried "Rainbox Jewels", using salmon, teal, and violet. Some came out muted and muddy looking but I'm sure they'll get used.

I had a little dye left over so I did 3 layers of fat quarters: Layer 1 teal, Layer 2 salmon, Layer 3 violet. I smooshed them down too much so the colors blended far more than they should have, but I really like them.

The last set was called "Forest Floor Neutrals" using scarlet, sky blue, and lemon yellow. From the website picture they looked like some greens and 2 browns. Not what I got.

These are a great variety of browns. I'm glad they didn't turn out correctly.

A lot of rinsing took place from these sessions, (the part I dislike the most) but well worth it.

To be continued............