A few photos of dyeing from yesterday, i resisted opening the fabric bundles, wish I had taken a photo of what they looked like when I took them out of the pot, the outsides at least changed dramatically, which much darker green showing through. The green is more a result of the alum. The main leaves that have successfully printed are our beloved eucalypts, we are so lucky in Australia having an abundance of this plant. Mindful that this fabric is probably a poly cotton, even harder to print than plain cotton. It didn’t dawn on me until later that cushion insert covers would likely not be cotton. The results with the iron blanket are interesting and i like the oak leaf print. I will move now onto some cotton sheeting and see how that goes. Yesterday I got a hint of a nice red onto cotton rag paper from a local tree leaf and got quite excited but it did nothing on the fabric. The paper was steamed and unmordanted. Also with the paper the colours all just merged with traces of prints (apart from a clear rose print and some of the sage). Interesting though and lots to work with… just need to get some more paper ordered, or maybe I just tear up what I have into smaller bits, only thing with that is it doesn’t work so well with larger leaves…. but does that really matter, its more about a feel of the place and traces, not so much about a story of the plants themselves.

This was the iron blanket (unbleached pdf calico) and was used folded over the top of the small piece below this is the outside

Inside of iron blanket, didn’t expect the print to permeate so many layers. The idea of the iron blanket is to reuse it. Not sure if I will as there are some nice prints. Maybe I will tear it up then i will have small pieces I can reuse in the dye pot and other pieces that can go into the work.

Front (dyed with iron blanket)

Reverse

Interesting that the print from the eucalyptus neglecta has printed through several times during the rolling process, layering itself through the fabric

Front sid

Reverse side

New notes added 9/9

Whoops, just went to add some more photos to yesterday and couldn’t find the post… looks like I forgot to publish it. Will add a few more photos and hopefully come back and do some more editing in next few days: