The Colors of Snow

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Art, color, design, design challenge, pattern, silk, snow, snow dye, tie dye

For textile artists living in areas with snow, winter provides a novel vehicle for putting color on fabric. The top image shows the original piece of heavy silk organza, a/k/a gazaar, that was prepped, manipulated, and piled high with various colors of dye mixed into snow. As the snow melts, the dyes, often composed of many otherwise hidden colors, begin to “strike” the fibers at various rates. This reveals unexpected intensities and blending within the fractured patterns that emerge from the unbound cloth.

A new Tie-Dye themed Design Challenge at Spoonflower.com was the perfect motivation for digitizing this snow dyed silk and creating the pattern above. Click here to vote for your favorite design through March 31, 2020.

Science Museum of Minnesota

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Art, diatoms, great blue heron, green heron, hand dyed silk, hand painted silk, Pine Needles, Science Museum of Minnesota, silk, St. Croix River Valley, St. Croix Watershed Research Station, St. Paul, walnut dyes

The Science Museum of Minnesota was directly across the street from the convention center and conference participants were able to visit for free. Again – a photo using the panoramic app. One of the things I especially like about taking pictures like this is the irregular shape of the image. It really bends the space.
There is a Pterodactyl(?) skeleton suspended from the ceiling and a world map in the floor of the entrance.

After leaving St. Paul, we drove to Marine-on-St. Croix to visit the St. Croix Watershed Research Station (SCWRS). I was an artist in residence there in 2008 and last year at this time delivered the piece I created as an interpretation of my stay at Pine Needles, the cabin designated as the “residence” for this program. I hadn’t had the chance to photograph the piece before delivering it to the station, so I took the opportunity on this visit. Click on the photo to see a larger version.
The pieces I create as interpretations of residencies tend to be more complex than my other work. Hopefully, the story of the two or three weeks I spend immersed in a new place become well integrated as a snapshot of that time. Once in a Blue Moon combines images I obtained from the research done in the river directly outside the door of Pine Needles – diatoms and discs used in Lead 210 testing of sediment core samples – with the plants and animals I observed during the three weeks I lived there – Great Blue and Little Green herons, the blue moon that occurred, and of course, the pine needles.  The SCWRS is part of the Science Museum of Minnesota.

Heron Moon

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full moon, green heron, Heron, silk, UW - Madison, Walnut Street Greenhouse

I recently learned that my piece Heron Moon, was purchased by the University of Wisconsin – Madison for one of the greenhouses on campus. Again, a purchase through the Percent for Art program administered by the Wisconsin Arts Board. Unfortunately, the Arts Board will be unrecognizable after the new fiscal year begins. It’s budget has been slashed by 75% and the remaining positions will be absorbed into the Department of Tourism. This is an enormous loss for the State and will impact the quality of life to which we’ve become accustomed. To learn more about how WBA is changing go to: http://artsboard.wisconsin.gov/

This piece was created by folding and dyeing in fiber reactive dyes, then silk screening the images with a chemical that removes the dye. The moon is silk screened using illuminated vat dye – a process that removes the base dye and replaces the color with the new reductive dye. Reductive dyes oxidize as they’re exposed to the air and the color can become quite intense. The green heron was screened onto a separate piece of silk and handpainted – again using fiber reactive dyes. Then he was cut out and appliquéed onto the background fabric.

The inspiration came from my residency at Pine Needles in Marine on St. Croix, Minnesota. The cabin was situated on the high bank of the river and I was able to look down to the Wisconsin shore line where I often observed juvenile green herons. All of the other animals on this piece also visited the cabin during my stay.