Lichen

As many of my primary photographs are of lichen, I decided to have a look in the library for some books on lichen, with images of other lichens that I probably won't find in Manchester.

 

I found this book in the science section of the library, it has been really helpful as there are some more exotic (if you can call lichen exotic) lichens, the book has opened my eyes to lots of colour and more textures and tactile qualities that lichens can possess.

 

I just thought I would post this image because I find it very striking, the hot coloured lichen in the stripes interest me the most, even though they aren't miles away from the warmness of the brown bark. I would like to take these colours into the weave room, but use them against a cold coloured background instead.

 

Another great image found in this book is this one:

 

 





This is a very interesting looking lichen, called map lichen, found in Glacier National Park, USA.

 

 

Whilst looking for imagery of lichens, I have found out some interesting facts about lichen too. One of the most intriguing facts about lichen was that they are very sensitive to air pollution, in particular sulphur dioxide, and is used by scientists to indicate polluted areas. Bushy lichens will need to have clear air to grow, leafy lichens can survive a small amount of air pollution and crusty lichens can survive with more polluted air. If there is a large amount of sulphur dioxide in an area, no lichen will grow.

 

I think this is an interesting thing to bear in mind, how the environment defines the type of lichen, in colour and texture. I could consider how environmental factors could change my work, such as hot/cold, (maybe trying to find some heat reactive dyes or pigments to experiement with) light/dark, (glow in the dark fibres etc?) dry/wet (colours that change when wet?) or even by using something that changes colour/texture over time? These are all interesting things to bear in mind when I am producing my collection of weave samples.



 

More Paper

I went to see the paper exhibition at Manchester Art Gallery that opened on Friday. Here are some images of the work I saw:


Wonder Forest by Manabu Hangai. He uses recycled materials in his work. These branches are suspended a couple of inches above the ground, and rotate freely and naturally in a slow and almost eerie way. It is very peacful to see them move, they are around 10 or 11 ft tall and you can walk through the forest and look at the leaves very closely. They are mixed media, primarily made of seawead, with other materials added for texture and colour. Hangai was there at the exhibition as it was the first day that the public could view the work, and he spoke about his work with a lot of passion, which inspired me greatly.

 

 

 

Here are some more photographs from the exhibition:

 

Laura Cooperman

 

 

 

Mia Pearlman

 

 

Rob Ryan

 

 

 



 

 

Su Blackwell

 

Béatrice Coron

 

 

 

Paper Continued

Following on from my last blog post I will show the progress of my paper making, and it isn't going well.
This is an image of my first attempt of making paper;

 

As you can see it has fallen apart, I think that the main error was that I didn't tear the paper up small emough, even though I soaked the paper for a long time.

 

These are my shredded newspaper samples:

 

                        

The top image is a sample made just of newspaper, and the bottom image has a bit of the pulp mixed in with it. These newspaper samples seem to be knitted together quite well, and once they are dry I think they will hold together quite well. You can't see any glitter in the samples yet, but I will inspect then once they are dry.

This is my tissue paper sample:

 

 

This sample is now dry. As you can see the blue pigment has dried quite a bit lighter than the colour it was when wet. This shows I need to use a lot more pigment for a brighter colour, something to bear in mind for next time. The tissue paper seems to have worked really well as a whole, the paper itself has held together really well, probably due to the thinness of the original tissue and the absorbancy.

 

 

I have prepped some more of the pulp that came with my paper making kit, here is an image:

 

 

I took a lot longer this time ensuring that the paper was shredded finely and poured boiling water instead of warm water to soak it in. I am going to leave that for a few hours, maybe even over night and then will add some pigments and maybe even some sequins or glitter to the mixture. Aready it looks like it may work better than my first attempt, and if so I will experiemnt with the original pulp some more.

 

After this experimentation I have come to the conclusion that paper making is not my strongest practice, however practice does makes perfect. These samples don't relate to my theme but I am hoping to produce some that do link to my work once I have found the best technique for paper making. 

 



Whilst taking this photograph I noticed the quality of shadow in the image. I took a photograph of just the shadow:

 

 

Although there is not an element of opposite in small proportion that I am looking at, I thought that the shadow looked very interesting. The three "shades" of colour in the shadow work well together and I was thinking that I could try manipulating this image in photoshop.. 

Paper

In response to my tutorial I went to the Fred Aldos shop and bought a paper making kit. I have made a start at making some paper from the kit...

However I found the instructions to this kit very confusing, they didn't explain exactly what to do and the materials seemed low quality. This is currently drying out but I am doubting that the pulp is even knitted together enough to hold together as a piece of paper.

I decided as this wasn't a great outcome to try this process out with different materials, so I have got some different pulps soaking in some water so I can mould them later. I have tried it out with some shredded newspaper:

 



This is the shredded newspaper soaking in water,  I am going to leave it for a few hours to see if it will disintergrate at all in the water. I have put a bit of glitter in there too, I am unsure what will happen but it's worth a try!

I have also got some tissue paper soaking in some water, and I have added some of the blue dye provided from the kit:

 

I am thinking that the tissue paper might work out quite well as it seems to absorb the water and ink really well. The tissue may even disintergrate a bit more to produce a more "pulpy" pulp. I will go back to these in a few hours and see if I can make something that resembles paper a bit more! 

Weave Workshop

Today was the sign up for the workshops, and I am very happy to say I got my place on the Weave Workshop! So now is the time that I will start to think about my warp, and I have a few ideas. I went into the weave workshop after the sign up to have a quick look at some of the yarns there, and I produced these three colour wraps.

I made these with the view that they would be doubled up. I am happy with these first three colour wraps, however I will still make more and decide from a larger group of colour wraps which one I will actually use. I will definitely use just one strand of the bright colour in my warp as I think this looks great and links perfectly to my concept.

Tutorial 1st Oct

Following from my tutorial I am very happy with my progress during the first week. I have now began to think about some new materials to bear in mind, maybe to start looking at glitter, sequins and beads. These are things that catch the light and would work great against something very dull. During the weave workshop (if I get a place) I could use these marials in conjunction with wools or very fluffy yarns.
I may even try out making my own papers to experiment with media, I think this could show my ideas quite well.
My concept has an element of "surprise" or "the unexpected", these could be introduced more toroughly through weave once I begin the workshop.