RedBarn Studios

for the past few weeks i’ve been busy cutting and stitching new coptic bound journals for the shop.  these new designs, so bright and cheery, are a limited edition that i’m calling “The Lauren Collection“.

each journal is made using a section of one my favorite hand dyed fabrics, one i call the ‘melody fab’ after one of my fav quit artists Melody Johnson.  she uses the bright, pure colours that i especially love myself.

hand dyed before

and after

i know, you’re thinking how the heck can she cut that up and look at the mess she’s got left!

nah…i dyed this piece last year so i had a long time to admire it, caress it and fall in love with the gorgeous colour over and over again.  i came across it in my fabric closet recently (yes i have that much fabric…don’t hate!) as i was looking for some inspiration and, when i spied it, I immediately knew what it had to become.

if you check my etsy store with the cut out pic above you can see the exact sections each journal was cut from.  i love, love love that! (why??? i haven’t the foggiest but am going with the happy place it puts me in)  i’ve finished four of the 7 i can get from this piece of fabric (plus another {“be the light“} that pulled me into finishing it before I completed the others).

i’m also working on some vintage-like christmas journals/albums that i’ll be adding to my shop in a couple of weeks — waiting for the paper to arrive –  these will be december daily journals that i think are such a fantastic idea!

omg….the creative juices are flowing and can’t get ideas outta my head and made fast enough.

toodles all,

G

Tags: Art, artful creations, hand dyed, journals, paper art by grace
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today is the first day of the SAQA Benefit Auction.  for the past few years SAQA (studio art quilts associates) has asked quilt/fiber artist to donate a 12″ x 12″ piece of artwork for their annual auction.   it’s wonderful to see each year how many artist take part.

the piece i donated this year is “amidst the fire” (on page 1b).

here are a few other pieces for your perusal…

“Under Cover” – Diane Marie Chaudiere

“Chiapas III ” – Pam Lowe

“Elysium” – Deidre Adams
(one of my absolute favorite fiber artist…love her work!)

“Deconstructed Flower II “- Deborah Weir

“Voila” – Olga Norris

“Gray Study” – Norma Schlager

how to bid
all the funds raised during the auction support SAQA’s ongoing mission to create exciting exhibitions, full colour catalogs and to fund outreach programs.

take a moment now to peruse all the wonderful artwork on SAQA’s website.   here you’ll find beautiful photos of each piece, info on how the auction works and a bidding form.

bidding starts today at 2pm (eastern time) and ends October 9th.   check out all the pieces and note which ones you’d like to see hanging in your home then go to the bidding form and send it it.   soon you too will be looking at 1, 2 or even 3 pieces of beautiful fiber art gracing your walls.

toodles,

Tags: community, fiber art, hand dyed, monday posts, this 'n that by grace
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a couple of weeks ago i teased you with a sneak peak at a journal i made for a friend.

nancy cook had the brilliant idea of bartering our creativity!   she would give me a pile of neutral hand dyed fabrics for my nancy crow class but, in lieu of a monetary payment, i would pay in kind.

nancy is a fiber artist who creates beautiful pieces that showcases nature through painted and stitched botanical illustrations.   from this knowledge i created a journal specially for her.

for the cover i used a piece of my hand dyed fabric that overflows with different greens, golds and bluish greens to convey her passion for nature.   i then machine quilted swirling leaves all over to represent the sometimes  lyrical botanical illustrations in her work, and painted them with a burnished gold Lumiere.

i needed to keep any embellishments simple so, after much deliberation, i decided to use an almost transparent, shimmery organza ribbon to edge the journal both front and back.

uPDate: i originally used the ribbon as a tie closure but removed it because i felt the ribbon was too thin and would not hold up over time.    instead i covered a button with some of the same hand dyed fabric and added an elastic loop that i painted with Lumiere paints to match.

the journal is chock full of 144 pages that includes 24lb text weight paper, watercolour paper, recycled brown paper and even some graph paper all contained in 4 fat signatures.   each signature is sewn individually to the cover using pearl cotton thread i hand dyed to match the cover.

i constructed an envelope, attached at the back of the journal, as a convenient place to keep slips of notes and other ephemera she might collect.

when i got it finished i wanted her to see the complete finished journal first and, now that it’s been presented to her (with a lovely squeal of pleasure from her i might add), i can show it off to you.

i’ve been working hard on creating more journals that i’ll be putting up on my now empty etsy shop (sad sad state of affairs i know) but will posting about them here first. Check my website to see all the journals I’ve made and find one just for you.

Toodles,

Tags: commissions, hand dyed, journals, paper art by grace
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this past Monday i hosted my 5th Annual Dye Day but didn’t dye any of my own fabrics…i was so caught up in seeing what everyone else was doing.    on Tuesday though, the itch to get my fingers in some dye couldn’t be stopped. I decided to try a new thing for me.

about 3 months ago i made a large portable flat top for surface design.   i spread my soda ashed soaked fab and painted on the dye…usually I scrunch in a container and squirt dye over it.

i LOVE how these new pieces came out!!! I call this one the Melody FAb cause this is just the type of fab she creates.

the Melody FAb

i know you’re supposed to work to get the bubbles out but look at the magic my bubbles produced… SPLENDID indeed!

Melody FAb detail

this one looks like beautiful stonework or a piece of granite…mmmh.   this was the one that started the itch….I sat up in bed on Monday eve and thought, what if I diluted black and havana brown.  can you believe those were the only 2 colours i used here?

stonework

the 2nd piece i painted was one of the gradation fabs I did for Nancy Crow workshop, originally golden yellow, it got messed up in the wash with green splotches so i saved it for the overdye pile.

forest fire

below is the 3rd piece I painted….lots of cerulean blue, sky blue, black and the last of the chatruese dye….a perfect storm.

storm

Doesn’t this next one look like an over saturated pic of an x-ray of teeth?   this was another that needed to be overdyed so i pleated and scrunched it then squirted (back to regular programing) 2 colours on it still managing to keep some of the original yellow colour.   this’ll be an interesting piece to use in my work.

teeth

so here’s who came over to play on Monday…

Michele (rinsing fabs)…

DeLane (on right mxing dyes)…

Susan (all geared up for play)…

& PJ (our resident newbie)

It were fun!
(Mummy please don’t mind the language).

Tags: hand dyed, hand dyeing, pandoras, surface design by grace
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i took pics of all the fabs i dyed last week and had all intentions of working on getting them posted in the wee hours when we were on our trip this past week. yeh, right….the best laid plans and all.  so Sat night before doing anything else i cropped and labeled them all, ready for posting yesterday.

but….best laid plans came into play again cause my mOjo somehow reappeared and ya know we gotta work when the muse hits.

so with out further ado here’s the results of my in the zone dye day, yippee!

don’t ya just love the gradation thing going on????

see the three yellow ones on the top…i actually did a 5 gradation run of  Dharma golden yellow  but this time, boo hoo.  because i did so many fabs i tried rinsing them all in the same wash in the machine (i usually separate the lighter colours).  ix-nay on that one and i should have known better.

splotchy won’t do for NC’s workshop so i’ll either over dye it or do some screen printing.  as a matter of fact, a bit of both might be in order.

the drudgery of ironing
when have lots of fabric to iron i set up my ironing board with my large studio board on it in front of my bed with the board at a comfortable ironing height and then have at it.  i figure there’s no sense in standing and shifting from foot to foot…sitting and ironing can only be a good thing…you guys should try it.

anyway that’s how I got these pics.  was trying to get a good angle on all the newly dyed fabrics all in a row and couldn’t, so tried a spiral.  love it!!!

gradations came out fairly evenly from one fab to the next.

remember this:

here’s the shirt that resulted….and i’ve worn it already i might add…..ha!

when i first brought the fabrics upstairs to begin ironing i just dumped them on my bed. Connor came in and, seeing a chance to play, dived right in throwing the fabrics everywhere.  had to get my camera for this one.

see the how excited he gets with newly dyed fabrics? Not!

my cutey pie

toodles,

Tags: hand dyed, hand dyeing, hand dyes, monday posts, pic of day by grace
10 Comments »

my friend susan called me out on the fact that i left that teaser in my last post with no pics of the results, hee hee.  truth was i was so darned tired from being in a hot garage all day saturday that I couldn’t contemplate being out there on sunday as well.

besides…it was father’s day!

so here’s a pic of a stash of fabs I did last year to satisfy any withdrawal symptoms you might be experiencing and me begging forgiveness

YOWZA  YOWZA  YOWZA!

(p.s…..it wasn’t planned that melly testa‘s book would be in the pics
just how it happened folks cause that book is a must have!)

today’s update:
…rinsed out fabs & shirt
…hung on rack to dry
…about to be ironed & photographed
…result: gorgeous new yummy fabric in my stash
…did a batch more today as well.

On a flipping roll I am!

toodles,

Tags: hand dyed, hand dyeing, hand dyes by grace
2 Comments »

ever since I discovered i could dye my own fabrics i kinda get into a zone when i actually get to do it. it’s been such a long while since i did anything creative and it felt sooooo good to get my hands into the dye pots again.

this time i’m dyeing fabrics for my class with Nancy Crow and, as most of you probably know, she requires A LOT of yardage in all colourways, shades and tints for her workshops.

I usually dye fabric the Anne Johnston way…..piling 3 pieces of fabric in a large jar using 3 different dyes on each layer (see above). i love the way these fabrics turn out, sort a serendipitous adventure.

this time, however,  i need tints and shades of each colour….and that means gradation dyeing that i haven’t done since i started dyeing years ago. instead of using baggies with lots of water, I utilized a low water immersion technique (thinking green here) and small plastic containers.

the process

…made up a 1 cup solution of dye for each colour

…poured 1/2 cup of it into a measuring cup

…dribbled that over one of the 1/2 yd pieces of soda-ash soaked cloth

…manipulated it with my gloved hands so all the cloth is coloured. I then

…topped off the remaining dye solution with a 1/2 cup of water

…mixed it thoroughly then

…poured out a 1/2 cup of that newly mixed solution and

…dribbled that over another 1/2 piece of fab. i continued like this until all 6 pieces were done.

the wait

i then repeated these steps for each colour and stacked up bin after bin, soooo cool to behold!  btw, i got these hand dandy containers at Target….rubbermaid takealongs squares…. 8 for about $4.00…sweet deal!.

meanwhile…
i had a white shirt that had definitely seen better days (dingy white is so out!) and decided to used some of the remaining dyes on the shirt that i scrunched up in a small bin. can’t wait to rinse this out, love the rainbow effect!

next post…the results, stay tuned.

for more in depth tutorials on dyeing check out these:
paula burch’s “all about dyeing”
terri stegmiller’s “2 colour gradation”
melody johnson’s “the lazy dyer”
melissa’s “fabric dyeing 101″
cynthia st charles’”conservation dyeing“
(this is not the most comprehensive list but a start for those not familiar or needing a refresher)

Tags: hand dyed, hand dyeing, hand dyes by grace
5 Comments »

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Here’s a short blurb from Christine Kane newsletter:
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“Clarity trumps practicality. When someone is clear, and they take action from that place of clarity \’96 then practicality has no choice but to move aside and let manifestation occur.”
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Love it!
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ART BREAK:
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My first foray into watercolour. The pic above shows a small piece (2.5 x 3) painted on 140 lb watercolour paper. I made it to grace the front wrap-around cover of a new journal I designed.
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A while back I bought myself a Winsor & Newton halfpan 12-set compact on sale thinking it was enough to start with but not enough expenditure if I found I didn’t like it.
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Uh oh……I LIKE IT!
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Took the watercolour paints out a few weeks ago looking for something different for my journals and this is what I came up with. Yummy!
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Still experimenting with other paintings. I just love the mixed media aspect of these journals. It’s held in place on a piece of my hand dyed fabric with metal brads and staggered stitching.
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Tags: Art, hand dyed, mixed media, paper art by k grace howes
3 Comments »

I’ve finished a new art quilt “At Odds”, ready just in time for the QBL Show coming up at the end of this month. My muse feels good. Detail of the quilting below.

I also have 2 new journals that will go in my etsy shop. One is done in a beautiful tan leather and is filled with sheets of 140lb watercolour paper. On the front page of each signature is a cutout of a dragonfly. Love those creatures.

The second journal is filled with 4 signatures of drawing & writing paper with a brown suede spine. On the front I placed a saying by William Wordsworth that I love…….”Fill Your Papers with Breaths of Your Heart”.

Update: SOLD!

On the inside I’ve added 2 painted pocket pages ready to hold those bits of paper we all seem to gather to us.

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See ya next time “In the Hayloft”,

Tags: Art, fiber art, hand dyed, my muse, paper art by k grace howes
1 Comment »

One of my goals this year is two-fold…to push myself to make more art quilts and put my work and my name out there….scary though it may seem at times.

To that end, last month I created a piece for the Deltas of Charlotte’s Silent Auction called “It Takes a Village“. I also knew I wanted to put a few pieces in Collage Mania this year as this is the last year it will be held.

Collage Mania 2009, a Fiberart For A Cause online fundraiser for the American Cancer Society, was founded by Virginia Speigel, an artist whose father survived colon cancer.

In trying to find a way to give more, Virginia started by raising some extra funds with a 7 postcards. That blossomed in hundreds of postcards over the last 3 years.

To date, Fiberart For A Cause has donated over $165,000 to the American Cancer Society. This year Virginia wants to raise $20,000 to top her record last year of $13,000. In order to do that she has opened it up to include not only postcard sized pieces but any collages up to 8″x10″ size.

Since I’m not a postcard type of gal, the slightly larger format worked well for me. Here are the four I donated.

Faith

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Believe

The background fabric of each collage is one of my hand dyed fabrics I screen printed and stamped. I then played with strips of fabric and paper to create each piece, then finished off with some free-motion machine quilting.

Each collage  is stamped with a word that represents the power within all of us to preserver through the worst of times, even when we feel the need to give up.

Faith…..Believe…..Release…..Trust.

Release

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Trust

This year Collage Mania will be held May 5-7th. Patrons are asked to bid on collages donated by a wonderful community of  fiber and mixed-media artists.

May 5th is Gold Donor Day where there is a minimum donation of $80.

May 5th – 7th, which is Regular Collage Mania, the minimum donation for a collage is $40.

To Donate

Cancer, at some point, touches all out lives. Please consider making a donation in honor of someone close to you who has been touched by this disease.

Bookmark the Collage Mania page and revisit the site on one of the above dates. You will be a very proud owner of a wonderful piece of art by those artist willing to give a little bit of themselves for a very worthy cause.

Each of my collages is dedicated in memory of my Aunt Cynthia, who died from cancer in 2007.

See ya next time “In the Hayloft”,

Tags: Art, fiber art, hand dyed, mixed media, surface design, working small by k grace howes
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