Looking and layering
As those of you who follow me on Instagram would know, I’ve spent a far whack of time lately making veneers based on the leaves I collect on my walks. It starts with boring old white clay* and pastels. Then I use a combination of techniques like silk screening and texturing and scratching back surfaces and distorting and layering, layering, layering. My goal is to recreate the colours and textures of each leaf. I may not always get it exactly the same, but it’s the vibe of the thing! It has been a challenge for me to just keep creating these veneers and ignore the voice telling me to MAKE something from them! Quite possibly, I will eventually make something but I want to discipline myself to explore without that pressure of productivity. Tough for li’l old me!
It’s not the sort of thing where I can make detailed notes so that I can make exactly the same veneer another time. Nor am I a detailed note kinda girl. It’s more that I record (loosely!) my observations about what happens when and seeing if it applies in various contexts. I try to stay light and curious and exploratory. What happens when I make this the base colour and press this tool on top of it then silk screen over that? What happens when I impress the whole thing with a coarse fabric and dust a deeper coloured pastel on top? What happens when I run ALL this through the pasta machine at a thinner thickness? What happens when I put this shade over this tint?
A couple of the leaves have had these fabulous magenta spores on them. Even if I sprayed them, the spores shrivel so the photos are not accurate and my recreations are of the spores in the state they were when I collected them.Surprisingly bright!! I could make a heap of just these!!! I feel a collection coming on!
My poem of the week is Dear Failure…gosh this one resonated. Here’s a bit but read it all!
I so want to get it right,
this showing up for the people I love.
I so want to get it right,
this longing to be enough.
Oh failure, I have not wanted
to learn your lessons, have wanted
to believe I could fix, could be all….
Each time I fall,
you reach out to take my hand
saying, Fail on, sweetheart.
Wouldn’t you like
to try again with your loving?
For the polymer people…I’m using a lot of white Cernit or Premo and Pan Pastels. Melanie Muir’s textures have been WONDERFUL and I’ve used Moiko and Lucy’s silk screens. Possibly in very different ways than intended! Those who’ve done my classes will know that the MOST often used texture tools are the bits and pieces in the boxes! Pen tubes, computer bits, sticks, hardware things…the usual, unusual suspects!
Stay curious and open my friends.
And lest it all look overwhelmingly pinky greeny…be ready for a blast of rosella and pigeon inspired stuff sooner than you might expect!