Author Archive | Ellen Lindner

Dying Yardage

By Ellen Lindner on June 15, 2019 in Uncategorized

When dying fabric there are two types I want to produce: yardage, and specialty. Yardage has a mostly all over pattern and can easily be cut up and used. Specialty looks almost like a whole cloth design, with thought given to composition and such.

These yellow pieces fall firmly into the yardage camp. The top one had a white background initially. Can you see how such a high contrast fabric might be difficult to use? Changing the background to yellow/yellow-green makes it both more interesting and more usable.

The bottom two fabrics are both “rubbings,” (done with a foam roller.) The left texture was created by a piece of shelf liner and the right one was a plastic sink liner. I’ve discovered that I don’t like rubbings over isolated details, but these all-over ones are easy to do and they have a nice imperfection to them.

These next 3 fabrics are all re-dos. The top one was an imperfect shibori dyed fabric. The circular images were very subtle, so I played them up by painting green all around them.

The next one was large black crosses on a white background, with a few blue blotches. Again, very hard to use due to the contrast. So, screen printing the background a dark color helped minimize that.

The bottom one, above, was an ugly experiment. I rolled on some texture. Can you tell it’s the same sink liner from the yellow fabric before it? (I think this blue version is a little too perfect. I’ll aim for some sloppiness with future texture rolling.)

This next photo demonstrates a variety of techniques.
1- It started as a nearly white clean up rag, with some interesting marks. I screened on the yellow-green and then used a squirt bottle to add the black circles.
2-In a moment of laziness I tried to mix colors together directly on the fabric.
3 & 4- Both pieces originally had a white background. Again, too much contrast, so I added yellow-green to #3 and pure green to #4.
5-Some sort of ugly fabric with dull yellow-green added.
6 – A fun way to use up the last of the dye: smear on different colors and sorta smoosh them together with some clear paste.
7-A very ugly fabric was improved by the addition of a very dark screen printed design.

There’s so much to try and to learn!

Ellen Lindner

Accidental Learning

By Ellen Lindner on June 13, 2019 in Uncategorized

While dying fabric I’m learning a lot! Some of it comes from books and some of it I stumble upon.

Case in point, trying to mix thickened dye colors directly on the fabric. I had heard that they wouldn’t really mix in this way, but I was feeling lazy and had to give it a try. First, I tried it with a mixture of greens and some clear dye paste.

As expected, the greens were blotchy. But what was that lighter squiggly pattern? It was the clear paste, which acted as a resist to the other colors.

Bingo! That looked like something fun to play with.

So, I tried to repeat my results with a variety of colors and patterns. Red with circles, and pink with feathers.

Brown circles and orange spears/leaves.

Yummy! A quick and easy way to get a tone on tone pattern.

Ellen Lindner

“Forced to Flee”

By Ellen Lindner on June 7, 2019 in Uncategorized

SAQA’s “Forced to Flee” exhibit is very powerful. It recently opened in Melbourne, FL at the Ruth Funk Center for Textile Arts. As you might imagine, many of the pieces had to do with the refugee crisis, but others showcased the horrors of war, and the power of nature. There are 30+ pieces in the exhibit, so this is just a little taste.

This piece, by Eunhee Lee is called “They are Also Us.” It was chosen for the featured wall image, and rightly so. It’s a very moving piece.

I remember seeing this quilt online and being very struck by it. But, what I didn’t notice until I saw it up close was the imagery of people fleeing in the background.

Mary Palmer’s piece, “Prayer,” was about 8 feet tall. The shapes are the characters of a Muslim prayer.

It’s made from life jacket fabric cut into squares and stitched in a very open pattern.

Karen Tauber’s piece also featured heavy use of life jacket fabric and imagery. It’s called “Life Jacket Graveyard of Lesvos,” and it depicts the “Mountain of Misery” created as thousands of refugees discarded their jackets and rafts on this small Greek island.

As you can tell by the shadows on the wall, the bottom portion is extremely three dimensional.

“Missing Migrants” is the name of Genevieve Attinger’s piece, shown below.

As you can see in the detail shot below, she’s used tiny little “mummy” dolls to represent the people. Barbed wire depicts their final obstacle.

Claire Passmore also shows the refugee’s journey, reading from bottom to top. Her title asks the question, “Lucky Ones?”

She depicted those who died with sheer bodies, as seen below. Very moving.

And here’s one of the few pieces that didn’t focus on refugees. It’s called “Firestorm,” by Grace H. Wever. It depicts the firestorms which raged in bombed cities during World War I.

She depicted the fire very effectively with a variety of materials and techniques. It almost looked like it would burn you if you touched it.

All the artists in this exhibit approached their subjects in very thoughtful ways. The layers of meaning and subtle details gave strength to their stories.

Although not a happy upbeat exhibit, it is WELL worth visiting. It’s on display until August 24th, so you’ve got plenty of time to see it. (And it’s free!)

Ellen Lindner

Scenic Details

By Ellen Lindner on May 24, 2019 in Uncategorized

I’ve heard it said that “God is in the details,” and I believe it. In addition to the HUGE scenery we saw on our trip to the American southwest, we also appreciated many smaller details.

Like the trees leafing out in a remote canyon.

The petroglyphs that are over 1000 years old.

Each motif is about a foot high.

BTW, I learned these definitions: petroglyphs are”pecked” or scratched into the rock’s surface, while hieroglyphs are painted on.

In the midst of very limited moisture and greenery, hearty cacti still managed to put on a show.

There were many visual delights.

But, wait a second. Surely, there’s also inspiration in my own neighborhood. And what about yours?

Ellen Lindner

Scenery on a GRAND Scale

By Ellen Lindner on May 22, 2019 in Uncategorized

Is it possible to take a bad photo of the Grand Canyon? I kinda think not. Especially when the sun is low, the shadows are long, and the weather is perfect.

My husband and I were lucky enough to visit it on just such a day. The temperatures were perfect and the crowds were light, making it absolutely delightful AND awe inspiring!

Gorgeous!

We also visited Red Rock Canyons, west of Las Vegas. The rock formations there were quite varied, and very different from what we’d seen one state over.

This is the first rock formation you see in the park, and the one it’s named for. I believe it’s called Castle Steps and this photo shows about half of it.

Now look at a closer shot of the far left end. Doesn’t it look like God was kneading together some red and yellow rocks? I think the smooth folded effect is very interesting.

Of course, there’s also man-made majesty in the area. Like the Hoover Dam. We took a tour on the inside of the concrete structure and really enjoyed it.

Yes, it’s a LONG way down!

I always feel more like I’ve gotten away from my routine when a trip includes scenery and seasons different from what I’m used to. Nevada and Arizona did not disappoint!

Ellen Lindner

Other travel posts with a view:
Captivating Colorado,
Virginia’s Country Charm

Collage Springboard

By Ellen Lindner on May 11, 2019 in Uncategorized

Remember when I posted about making small fabric collages and then cropping them to get abstract design ideas? Well, I decided to use one of my examples as the springboard for a new quilt. I used this photo collage of tropical foliage.

Using photo editing, I removed the color to focus on the design lines.

I DID NOT plan to make a foliage quilt. Or a green one. Instead, I wanted to mimic this angled composition and, if I had the right fabric, try to copy the scale and shape of these patterns. Perhaps most importantly, I wanted to use hand dyed fabrics in a fairly large scale.

Step one: plow through my hand dyed fabrics and find ones that had large scale patterns, and patterns that hinted at those shown above. Oh, and I was working larger than usual so the fabrics needed to be in fairly large pieces. These are the ones I pulled.

Kinda disparate, right? But, I was pretty much in love with the combination. And, after my recent class with Pat Pauly, I felt confident enough to try all of these together. Next, I needed to try them on the design wall and see if I had pieces large enough to work.

So, I liked the general tilted composition and the colors. And I thought the large scale print in the top left emulated the palm fronds quite nicely. But, I could see that I would have difficulty finding enough fabrics large enough to fill the large corner spaces. (This was 48″ square.) Therefore, I decided to downsize to 42″, and to rearrange the fabrics so that the largest pieces could fill the largest spots.

The large scale print (top right corner, above) was one of the largest pieces of fabric I had, so I moved it to the largest spot. I used the same criteria with the bottom left spot. I wanted the top left and lower right corners to me almost solid, (like the sketch,) IF I could find fabrics to carry it off.

Notice the dark twig/berry fabric lower center above. Since it was not very big I knew I’d need to fill the gap above it with other fabrics. I could have moved the dark fabric up to center, but I liked the idea of having something that dark down low. Of course, it could all change easily!

I proceeded with plenty of trial and error: placing, studying, moving, and repeating. Most of the fabrics were folded at this point, rather than cut.

MANY changes came after this, but I was beginning to get happy with the colors and shapes. I found it to be invigorating and challenging!

I’ll show you more progress soon.

Ellen Lindner

Lessons Learned: Dying and Designing

By Ellen Lindner on May 7, 2019 in Uncategorized

Pat Pauly is a WEALTH of knowledge, so I really learned a lot when I took a 5 day dyeing/printing class with her.

First up: colors look different when wet vs. dry. Leslie’s samples served as examples.

Bigger can be better. This piece, below, is about 31″ x 45″. So, Pat finally got me to work larger. And I have to say I love it. I’ll be buying a big screen.

Leftover dyes work well when just smeared on. Who knew? (This is Pat’s example, below.)

Everything goes with everything. These are my words, not Pat’s, but it seems to apply to the way she combined things. UH-mazing! To my eye, she seemed to purposely pick the most jarring fabrics to use together and then they looked good. What?

She demonstrated this over and over by folding fabrics so their disparate parts ended up playing together nicely. THIS is what I want to be able to do!

This detail shot of one of her quilts shows what I mean. I would have never used burgundy and fuchsia together, but with a little bright yellow (again, unexpected) mixed it in all works. The other thing I want to learn.

As much as knowledge as I gained in this class it was also humbling as I realized how much I still need to explore and work on. I’m invigorated and excited to try it all!

Ellen Lindner
P.S. Pat also got me to wear long gloves, but not an apron!

Dying with Pat Pauly

By Ellen Lindner on May 3, 2019 in Uncategorized

My dyeing/print making class with Pat Pauly was amazing. She’s SO comfortable with thickened dyes and what she can do with them that it was almost hard to keep up.

This was the first demo, about using stencils. She doesn’t use them with a screen, but just hangs on to a corner and scrapes dye through. It’s fast!

Next, she scrapes on background color. (See the berry and yellow streaks above.) Adding the background color does alter the previously stenciled areas some, but she’s not worried about it.

Pat picks up the perfect amount of dye for the perfect spread/scrape. I haven’t mastered that yet and it does make a difference. For instance, if it’s too wet and gloppy everything smears when you do the next thing.

Judy (I think) had good luck with stencils. Don’t you love the colors?

I like these “open” stencils, like those used above. They allow lots of color to print, leaving a more delicate background peaking through.

Next, we learned about putting textured items below our fabric and lightly rolling on dye. Check out Jim’s piece: those large circles are toilet flanges! (Several people headed to the hardware store after learning this.)

Pat also talked to us about having contrast within each piece of fabric: light/dark, large/small, busy/quiet. But, she said not to aim for a whole cloth quilt fabric. I think Jim hit all the marks.

We learned monoprinting next. It was very fun to do – almost like finger painting. But, I didn’t like my results. This was a very ugly bright green monoprint. I tried to resurrect it by painting over the majority of it with a dark blue (still wet here.) Better, for sure. I made the screen with soy wax, which was rather challenging with such a detailed design.

On day 2 we washed the day 1 fabrics and at the end of the day we had SUCH fun pulling that stuff out of the dryer! As you can see, Pat was pretty happy with them, too.

I don’t have many photos of my own fabrics. This is my favorite one, in-progress.

Here’s some more work from around the room. This large piece was created by Sandy, who is an experienced dyer. It shows! She worked a lot with newspaper stencils. That’s how she made the large circles.

This one, by Melinda, featured rolling over textures, stenciling and scraping color on. That scraping is really fun!

I can’t wait till I have more time to finish up my class fabrics (~8 yards,) and then to USE these puppies!

Ellen Lindner

“Slightly Unexpected” Complete

By Ellen Lindner on May 2, 2019 in Uncategorized

In my last post, I showed you my latest abstract quilt in-progress.

Here it is finished: Slightly Unexpected.

I added hand stitched and padded black circles to keep the white one company. The rest of the background is pretty densely stitched.

I’m happy with this quilt and anxious to try out some more abstract design.

Ellen Lindner

Working on an Abstract Quilt

By Ellen Lindner on April 30, 2019 in Uncategorized

In an earlier post, I showed you a quick exercise for generating abstract designs. After making several “postcard collages” I decided to use one of them to create a quilt.

This was the original collage.

I cropped it and got this. I think it’s much more dramatic skinny like this.

I played with it just a little bit on the computer and got this as my sketch.

But, oops, I had lost the skinny drama, so I had to change that back.

Next, I pulled out hand dyed fabrics, and others, to see if I had what I needed. Yes, I thought I could make it work.

I placed a piece of muslin on my design wall and drew out my planned size. Then, I started working on the large black shapes. I figured they were the keys to the whole design, so I needed to get them in place first. Since I work in raw edge collage it’s a simple matter to cut the fabrics to shape and place them.