Surface Design's Magazine

The summer issue of Surface Design, the journal of the Surface Design Association, has been published. Suzanne Smith Arney wrote an article entitled "Forest Matrix" about my Forest Surfaces work. See if you can get the issue, as always, the magazine is scrumptious in it's visuals and articles. Patricia Malarcher and her staff do a wonderful job producing this magazine and I am honored to have my artwork in Surface Design.

Golden Digital Grounds

For several years, I have been printing on all sorts of substrates using inkAID products. Recently Golden introduced a line of digital grounds for the purpose of printing quality images on a variety of surfaces. Thanks to Golden, I had the opportunity to use this new line of Golden products. The prints on lutradur used in Bark 13 have been coated coated with Golden's white matte and the lace paper has been coated with the clear gloss.

Bark 13 is 16" x 16" and made up of lutradur and lace paper, wrapped around twigs and jute twine with copper wire. The work is assemble on hardware cloth.

Forest Surfaces 9

Finishing photographs of some of my new work, so this will be the first of 3 new pieces I will post in the next couple of weeks. This piece is 18" x 19" and is composed of tyvec, lutradur, watercolor paper, dyed canvas and dyed cheesecloth, with a layer of crocheted hemp assembled on hardware cloth with brass wire.

The original print is a photo taken in Yosemite National Park. This photo is a reflection of El Capitan mirrored in the Merced River. Prints on tyvec, lutradur and watercolor paper are layered with crocheted hemp, dyed canvas and dyed cheesecloth. The lutradur surface is printed over a coating of inkAID white matte precoat. I heat distressed the print on lutradur, which is the top layer.

When the first of the layers were assembled, I created a print on both sides of tyvec without using any precoat so that the print would be a lighter color on the back side. This print is cut into small squares and using brass wire I attached hemp and the squares to the top of the surface that had already been completed. A detail is included.

Bark 11, 27" x 15"

One of 3 new pieces in the works. This one is composed of 3 separate layers of lutradur that is coated with a light layer of inkAID's white matte precoat. Each layer was heat distressed to leave holes and worn away spots in the printed lutradur. The 3 layes of distressed lutradur shows a fragile surface giving the appearance and texture of bark. The original picture Bark 11 (before being digitally manipulated) is a detail section from a Kauri tree in the Waipoua Forest of Northern New Zealand. This is truly one of my favorite places on our planet:)

After the top 3 layers, I tied 5" pieces of twigs into heavy weight jute cord and wrapped that on top of the same Kauri print on metallic crinkle paper. All these layers were wrapped with 24 gauge copper wire and then wired to hardware cloth.

This piece will show for the first time at La Jolla Fiber Arts in La Jolla California. The show will open on July 28, 2008 with an opening reception on Friday night August 1st.

Playing with Inspire Me Thursday

Okay so it isn't quite Thursday, I am a few days late. I have been working on a show of my work for La Jolla Fiber Arts that will open at the end of July. I will start posting some of the work later this week. Until then........

I was visiting INSPIRE ME THURSDAY - the theme from the 12th is "Find the Art in the Everyday". Well everyday I admire a huge cactus in the front of my studio. This year it is endowed with an abundance of flowers and looks outstanding. Taking a pic of a small part of the cactus I create a pattern from a selection of the picture. I then fill a page with the pattern so I could print it for my art journal, (when I print an image to a journal page, I take the opacity down so that the image can be covered with writing). If you are interested, some of my pages are on my www.kathyanneart.com
website.

Here I posted the pic, the pattern and a 16" page full of the pattern.

Check back in a day or two and see some of my new work for the La Jolla show.

Forest Surfaces 8

Finished this new forest surfaces piece yesterday. It is the beginning of the work that I will have in a show at La Jolla Fiber Arts opening on July 28, 2008. Lots to do between now and then.

Forest Surfaces 8 is 20” x 24” and has been assembled on hardware cloth with floral wire. The layers consist of:

*A digital print on tyvec that has been heat distressed. The tyvec is printed on both sides.
*A digital print on lutradur
*Jute twine knotted with twigs
*Aluminum screen
*Colored hemp that is crocheted
*A digital print on both sides of Fabriano Artistico hot pressed watercolor paper 140 LB

Forest Surfaces 7 is lying on my table in pieces, this is the redo from a piece called Yosemite Falls finished at the end of last year. Stay tuned for how that turns out, hopefully this afternoon, I will decide on the final configuration, but then again, maybe not☺

JULY WORKSHOP REMINDER

On the 28th, 29th and 30th of July, I will be teaching about printing specialty surfaces on an ink jet printer. The class is titled Creating Designs on Textiles and specialty paper from digital prints. We will cover the A to Z of printing on many surfaces. We will be working with lutradur, tyvec, organza fabric, canvas, watercolor paper that has been previously dyed, a substrate we will make from gel media and cheesecloth, pima tex cotton and poplin. Think that covers most of them. In the 3 days of the class we will use inkAID to coat the various surfaces and learn how to get a quality print. We will use my Epson R2400 printer for the prints and the class will be a hands on class. After learning all the information from this workshop you will be able to use your inkjet printer and print digital images on a wide variety of surfaces. This will be a great class, so if you are going to be in the Flagstaff, Arizona area at the end of July, you can go to the website and sign up. You can also email me for more information. It does say that this is not a beginning workshop, but I will work with all levels of ability.

Above you see a few different surfaces. The first one is a print on cream mica wrinkle paper. The second pic is what the mica wrinkle looked like before printing. The third surface is one that I made from gel media, cheesecloth and inkAID. The forth is a metallic wrinkle paper. This surface was scratched a little before printing.All the surfaces were coated with some type of inkAID before printing.

In the Works

This is what I call the reincarnation of Yosemite Falls. That piece is in the post for Dec 3, 2007 entitled Yosemite Falls. I took it apart and tried some little textural samples from my textural journal and this is the beginning of putting together the pieces to finish what will be called Forest Surfaces 7. This is a first look and after some of my deadlines this week I hope to finish it by the end of May.

What aTreat!

I am staying with my daughter, helping her take care of our new grandchild. Ryan Sabrina came into our life on May 2, 2008 at 8 pounds 7 ounces, 21 inches. She is of course a little sweetie, but what grandma wouldn’t say that. It’s been 30 years since I had my last and having a baby to hold and rock to sleep is no less enjoyable. What a little miracle she is and how exciting to think of what she will see in her lifetime. Ryan is a great sleeper and after the first 2 nights home when she wasn’t sleeping at all, that is a wonderful thing. Right now she is on pretty much of a 4 hour eat and sleep schedule, how I wish mine had done that.

I am writing an article for Cloth Paper and Scissors with a deadline of June 1. The article will appear later this year, so I have lots to keep me busy in between caring for baby. At the same time I am reworking the art from Yosemite Falls I took apart.

On the 13th of May I leave for Omaha for my other daughters wedding. I will post pictures of the family and more artwork after that.

Enjoy!

Forest Surfaces 6

As I work the studies from my textural journal I am experimenting with a variety of fibers and surfaces. Forest Surfaces 6 (7" x 7") started from another composition recently completed on Yosemite Falls. I took that piece apart entirely to rework it, I just didn't like it. That artwork appeared in another post on December 3, 2007. Currently I am reworking other parts of that same artwork.

Expanding the surfaces I am working with is inspiring. Next year I will be teaching a workshop in printing on uncommon surfaces with an ink jet printer, at the Surface Design Association Conference. More on that soon……

Forest Surfaces is composed of several layers:
Twigs are seen on the top, they have been tied into strips of fiberglass screen. The digital prints are on the following surfaces- canvas, organdy,tyvec and lutradur distressed, with dyed canvas and dyed cheesecloth mixed in.