What's On Your Table?

Here's a sampling of what is on mine.

Outside -

Outside work table, full of rust that I use for dyeing

And inside -

I use a couple of types of sewing thread in my hand stitching.
Usually variegated.

I place mohair tendrils
(or "trimmings" if you want to leave the poetry out of the picture)
on the felted base, then stitch over them for this
lovely curly-cue shape.
No thinking involved (during the stitching process that is).

couching down naturally dyed crochet thread

silk /cotton thread that accepts eucalyptus dye beautifully
(available at Christine Mauersberger's shop )
(this is dyed with euca from one of the trees in my yard)

I cannot get enough of those French Knots!
Especially beautiful on top of rusted batting.

Can you see the Spanish Moss that I captured under the
netting? It is in the left hand side of the photo.
This is one way to preserve memories - add things
that you collected during trips.
This one came from Charleston SC on a kayaking trip.
I felted the moss, netting and scrim onto the wool base.

Well, another piece of the fiber collage has been stitched.
By hand, that is.
What lovely plant matter shall I machine stitch on top of this one?

Rusty Goodness

I love the color of rust.
I love the depth of color that you can get when rusting fabric.
Here is a sampling of what I did with some of the rust that I have collected.

This is cotton jersey with a bit of spandex.
I am making scarves out of the fabric - they are beautiful.
And so soft after washing, no hard particles of rust on/in these.
I have several scarves made from the fabric and I love them all. A couple of them are embellished with a technique that I wrote a magazine article about. It's coming out later this year.
These are about 9 inches and the length varies (shortest one is about 70 inches).
If you're interested in purchasing one, shoot me an email.
I will send you photos of the finished scarf.
The price is $45.

Rust Graveyard

I have quite an impressive collection of rusted pieces.
My husband and I cleaned it out a few weeks ago, narrowed it down to only two (5 gallon) buckets and a small container of tiny pieces.
I pulled out a few pieces to begin on a book idea that I've had rolling around in my head for weeks.

Time to exorcise (or exercise) that ghost, right?

Found UFO's

No, not the flying kind but the kind that you put down one day never to pick up again.
The kind that gets buried under a pile of awesome stuff that you can't pass up nor part with.

I was going through a bunch of my supplies, trying to get rid of a few things and found a handful of rusted fabrics that had a few beginning stitches on them.

I think that I was going to make a sampler book, of sorts.
I do remember taking it to baseball games, sitting in the stands, stitching away - quite happy to be there with my handwork. But I don't remember exactly what I was working towards.

Do you ever do that? Just work on small pieces, figuring that you will do something with it later on?
I do that when I can't quite figure out what my mind is leading me towards but my hands insist on doing something.
I always save the scraps from fabrics and such that I rust and dye. Some of them are just too beautiful to discard.
The photo above is an example of one of the things that I do with them.
I layer then onto a base fabric (usually black) and then build a story on top of this.

I rust and stitch such things as discarded pantyhose.

Old cotton lace. Canvas. Sheer curtain panels. Your grandmothers silk slip (well, my grandmothers).
Drawer liner.

You just never know what's going to work (with dyeing or staining) until you try it.

I'm gathering all the bits and pieces of beautiful things that I find.
And then see what I can do to make use of them.

Remember that I sale packs of rusted media in my Etsy shop.
Check them out here.

Rust Love

My husband and I rust fabric and different fibers that I use in my artwork.
This is the front cover of a sketchbook that I made using it.

I also sell packs of "Rust Media" in my Etsy Shop (among other things).

Check it out!

MMA Team Treasury!

I have a listing on Etsy for "Rust Media Packs" that contains all types of different pieces of rusted fibers and fabric.
It has been chosen for a Mixed Media Art team treasury.
Run over and have a peek at the other verrrry interesting items that our "Mixed Media Art Team" has listed on Etsy!
Hope that all of you are staying warm (it's rather cold here in upstate SC) and being creative
on this 21st day of December...

This week in My Life

I belong to a great group of women artists - the Art Diva's.
It's an online group of like minded creative souls.
Full of awesome artists...my (new) buddy Joanne has organized and hosted an art banner swap that I jumped at the chance to be a part of. I met Joanne and a lot of the Diva's in Birmingham when I took DJ & Deryn's classes this summer. They had done a banner swap before the classes and when I saw them I really wish I had of participated...so, here was my chance to get in on the goodies.
I designed my banner around two of my favorite things - rust media and painted faces.
It's titled "She Was An Art Diva" but I told the ladies that I should have named it "How To Make an Art Banner The Hard Way" since that is exactly what I did- make it the hard way. I didn't have the final design in mind and was just piddling along, working in an intuitive manner..which is fine if you're not in a time crunch.
Was I in a time crunch?
Hahahahahahahah hahahhha (cough, sputter)
(clear throat) hahahahahhahahahaha...
A little bit of one - they are due to be in Michigan day after tomorrow...I started on them day before yesterday.
Needless to say I'm either sending them to each individual person or over nighting them to Joanne....we'll see what it cost to do both. I'll send them the cheapest way - unless the most expensive is only a small bit more (since placing 18 banners in one envelope is a LOT easier than placing 18 banners in 18 envelopes...and then writing the addresses...
you get the picture.
I suppose this is where Mr. Wonderful would say "round and round she goes, where she stops nobody knows..."

Here are a couple of pictures that I took along the way.Piles of yummy rust media to pick from...want some?
Go here and shop to your heart's content!

Sewing the strips onto a long roll of canvas with the banner shape drawn on the back side.
No color ink in my printer...I had to print the faces out in black & white onto fabric, then paint them individually...yes- 20 tiny faces by hand...

I printed the verbiage and then painted that also. I ironed Misty Fuse on the backs of everything to make adhering it all quicker and easier. I added a couple of layers of matt medium over it all to seal it.
All the girls - waiting for their first coat of matt medium to dry...

And here is "The Hard Way", um, I mean "She Was An Art Diva" banner.

Like McDonald's -

I'm lovin' it!

I may have a couple of extras - if I do email me and we can do a teeny tiny little private banner swap...or I might put them in my Etsy shop.

I'd rather swap!

This and That

Some people call ticket stubs ephemera...
I call these ticket stubs "Pure Jazz"...
Friday night my husband and I went to see Diana Krall in concert at The Peace Center in Greenville SC. We only live about 20 minutes from the Peace Center, so it was an easy drive.
What an awesome concert! I had forgotten to do a blog post about it this weekend and was reminded this morning when my husband sent me a review on it.
I'll include it below the pictures of my newest ephemera (pronounced f-in-mera).

Greenville Online Review

July 11, 2009
Review: Diana Krall heats up Peace Concert Hall
By Ann Hicks Arts writer
Sultry jazz singer/pianist Diana Krall's much-anticipated Peace Center concert — sold out some time ago — had her wall-to-wall aficionados swooning Friday night.
During her 90-plus-minute concert, the audience was treated to some superb jazz playing. The Grammy-winning Krall's solid jazz pianism, Grammy-nominated guitarist Anthony Wilson's masterful chord work, Jeff Hamilton's dynamic drumming and Robert Hurst's bass improvisations were the real stuff of this concert.
The standing ovation and the loud cheers that greeted the singer as she walked on stage, wearing a black dress, said it all. Her audience was there to hear Krall's liquid-smoke alto. She didn't disappoint with such standards as Harold Arlen's “Let's Fall in Love,” Harry Warren's “I'll String Along with You,” Nat King Cole's cover of Jerome Kern's “Pick Yourself Up” and Tom Waits' “Jockey Full of Bourbon.”
While Krall's vocal range is limited, her raspy, sexy approach makes each song work. Yet it is her at times feathery, at times robust and complex keyboard work that nails her delivery of each song. In fact, some of the night's biggest applause came with the powerful instrumental solos in Irving Berlin's “Dancing Cheek to Cheek” and Fats Waller's “Keepin' Out of Mischief.”
Krall is a highly personable entertainer. She paused from time to time to chat about traveling by bus with her 2½-year-old twin boys, missing husband Elvis Costello, shopping for toys at Greenville 's Mast General Store, hanging out with the kids at Cleveland Park and surprising her waiter by ordering fried green tomatoes for breakfast.
Gracious in thanking her enthusiastic audience, she encored with Carlos Jobim's “Quiet Nights” and “The Boy from Ipanema.”
Arts writer Ann Hicks can be reached at 864-298-4004.

Yep, that says it all. Diana really put on a great concert! My husband and I agreed that there wasn't a key on that piano that wasn't played that night...

Yesterday TR and I started another batch of rust media! This time I added more lace from my mom and grandmother's fabric stash. My mom used to make her own sheer curtains so she had plenty of lace panels in her stash. I decided to use them instead of packing them away to look at once or twice a year.
My friend, DJ Pettitt did a blog post yesterday about how she uses the rust media that my husband and I create.

Wow, what awesome work! I love DJ's mixed media books. I am still working on mine and have ideas for another, more focused one.

Anyway - go to my Etsy shop. Look around at the yummy rust media packs and fabric that DJ is in love with.

Look here at what Deryn Mentock did with a rusted yoyo that was in her pack.

I'll bet that you will fall in love too!

Rust Media

Here's a little sample of a small piece that I put together.

I mounted it onto a wrapped canvas.

Rust Media-gotta love it...