I had the opportunity to attend another class offered to and taught by LAFTA members. This class was taught by Joanne Weis. She stressed that the class was designed as a "technique" class and that we were not making "masterpieces." The goal was to learn the techniques. I can tell this is something I definitely want to do a lot more of. I took several pictures during the class. Check them out.
The first method of screen printing we tried was a resist technique using freezer paper. A pattern was cut from the freezer paper, and that cut pattern was ironed to the screen. We used dyes thickened with sodium alginate to produce the color. In this picture, Sally is using a Bondo applicator to apply the dye to her fabric.
Here is my first screen print. I didn't take a lot of time to cut the paper; it could have been a lot more intricate. I did learn how to do it (which was the goal). I have to keep reminding myself, that many other techniques can be used on this same fabric to produce depth in the piece. This is NOT a finished product.
The second technique we learned was to use a water-soluable glue stick to draw a design directly onto the screen producing a resist. This is Robin's screen.
This is how my glue-resist piece turned out.
For the last method, we used a Thermafax screen. We were each asked to bring a Xerox copy of a design. Joanne had her Thermafax machine and burned a screen for each student. Alyce mixed a great color for her piece.
Here is the design I drew up. The screen print is a bit more blurry than I'd like, and there are a couple of places that got too saturated with paint. I think a lot of that could have been avoided if I had taped the Thermafax screen to a plastic frame to give it a bit of stability. (That wasn't done in this particular class because of price and time constraints.) Without it, the screen was hard to hang on to, and it tended to shift a bit.
Joanne advised students how to get better prints.
Joann spoke about the methods she chose for her work (in the background).
I am very thankful to know artists who are so willing to give of their time, talent, and knowledge.
On the way home, I was blessed with this...
Isn't nature's color palette fantastic!
