Misty Faces

I have limited space currently 

so I am still exploring 

working on tea bags
I recently put up a new experiment 

and was asked about process

It begins with a tea bag

dried with side edges removed

on a silicon baking sheet

I draw a face with sumi e ink

this particular one

this time

I apply white egg tempera

(egg yolk, mixed with titanium dioxide white powdered pigment}

and end up with 2 faces

they are left to dry

the one on the left has been flipped over 

so the image is now facing down

I apply traditional gesso to the tea bag

then a piece of paper

which also has gesso applied

then another tea bag and another layer of gesso

so the sandwich consists of 2 tea bags and 1 paper filler 

and 3 layers of traditional gesso

they are then left to dry completely

before carefully peeling them off the baking sheet

I do not use silicon baking paper as you

 end up with a very wrinkly result

The flipped image 

The unflipped image is a lot mistier

This is after beeswax has been applied

flipped image

unflipped image

'Calista'

 is available in my Etsy Shop

and this is the original 

image

If you have any questions please leave a comment

 

Tea Bags plus

As a follow on from the post about teabags

I have continued to experiment

These lovelies are done the same except 

in one batch I had not cleaned the silicon sheet

and this gave me some lovely marks 

So I decided to do that deliberately

using avocado ink 

modified with washing soda

some of the marks seen here are

from a little of the ink mixed with egg yolk 

on the silicon sheet itself and

the darker redder ones 

are from the ink dripped in between the layers

I love the end look

But the question is can I paint on them!!!!

Not yet, these two are on the plainer bases

The First two faces for 2020

 221 Vanessa

222 Irene

Both in egg tempera using only bone black, titanium white, indigo blue and yellow ochre. 

What's in the Jars?

Or at least some of them.

For now I will focus on the 

Acacia Rust Gall Fungus

Uromycladium tepperianum

which I found by the bucket load

back in July 2019

I placed some in cold water

and some in Methylated Spirits

and at a later date I cooked some up

Below are the results

on the left side is 

watercolur paper

and on the right

Traditionally gessoed paper

Cold processed in rain water

Hot processed by simmering in filtered tap water

as above with added iron

hot processed then placed in a jar 

and washing soda added

soaked in methylated spirits

as above +iron

 the colours are a browner pink in reality

But at the moment I have serious studio restraints

Think tiny space next to the kitchen sink 

but only after the dishes are done

Some of these i will reduce further to create inks

I am also hoping to make lake pigment 

and then use as either a watercolur paint 

or with egg tempera

The ones in the meths I will add some shellac 

and see if I can get a nice shiny ink

Preparing Teabags

I admit I love to create little rituals around my arts practice.

Currently one of these is preparing teabags as a painting surface.

I am not a tea drinker; my husband performs that duty for me.

Two per morning during the week and 3 or more on weekends

An ongoing giving resource.

There is a small bowl beside the kettle in the tea making area, this ensures the teabags don’t go in the bin, all part of my make it easy strategy.

I pull the tags off and place them on another bowl that sits in the window to dry out.

I collect them up till I have 16 teabags, then I am ready to make a batch

To begin I prepare my traditional gesso* go here for a tutorial

This is not an acrylic gesso, which more properly is an acrylic ground

But a rabbit skin glue and calcium carbonate mix used while warm

1 level tsp of rabbit skin glue granules is enough for at least 2 batches

silicon mat

I lay out a sheet of soft light paper, that a friend found for me in an op shop, (it came from between the sheets of a photo album), onto my silicon mat which I can clean and reuse

I place a tea bag onto it and brush with the gesso smoothing out from the centre, it will penetrate through and glue it to the bottom sheet. I then place on a second teabag, and brush on more gesso to glue it to the teabag below.

I repeat these steps 7 more times and then leave them to dry.

When they are dry on the top surface, I peel the whole sheet off

 and flip it over to help the underside dry

When completely dry I tear them into individual pieces and trim the edges.

The teabags are now ready to use as a paint surface.

Handmade watercolour, natural pigment

egg tempera, natural pigment

frozen gesso

Quiet times at Chez Shed

Not a lot has been happening down here

in the deep south of

Western Australia

We did go out wood collecting

last weekend

should be cozy for the rest of the winter now

and the weekend before that

I was up in Perth

I attended a very interesting

Egg Tempera workshop

with

Glen Stewart

and this I produced

when I got home

I put it out in my studio

yesterday

and after hearing much

kerfuffling out there last night

today I found a few extra marks

teeth marks!!!

courtesy of Ratus ratus

Not the collaboration I had in mind

but still interesting.

Up to Perth again on Sunday

will be there for a whole week this time

Dan is doing a 4 day course and

I shall be amusing myself