Sorry. Couldn't resist the rhyme, even though it makes no sense. Rain, yes, lots of rain. It has been just pouring for the last week. Flooding, hillsides sliding, power outages, standing water like new lakes and just so dark. It's kind of a mess. So Ray and I took the train to Seattle for a slightly different view of rain and rain and rain. Truth is one of the days we were there the sky was blue and the sun shone—a little bit. Yesterday the rain was on again and we went out in it and the wind damn near blew us into the bay. View from a taxi:
Ray's face kind of says it all.
We did have a wonderful time at the Intimate Impressionism exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum.
The color of the plums in this Pierre Bonnard painting reminds one that somewhere the sun is shining and will someday shine again on the Pacific Northwest. Took the train home yesterday, missing the mudslides on I-5. Today it continues to pour.
Meanwhile, in the studio... My latest experiment was to color on a bit of fabric with watercolor crayons before adding deColourent using a wooden printing block. I wondered how the deColourent would affect the watercolor. Here it is drying:
Then I washed the chemical out and saw......
Almost nothing. Very little effect from the deColourent. So I laid the cloth on the printing block and used one of the watercolor crayons to make a rubbing.
I've gotten a couple days behind with my daily December experiments, but I'll be back to it tomorrow. I am enjoying them. I have had some comments suggesting that I need to go to the DeColourant web site to find out what to expect from the product before using it in differing ways. Yeah, well....then it wouldn't be an experiment, you see. Then it would be research, which is also good, but a different thing. Not knowing quite what to expect is the fun of experimenting.
Posted with Blogsy
Geez, there's a difference between experimenting & knowing the properties of what you're experimenting with so you don't keep wondering why it's not working. That would be akin to trying procion dyes not knowing they need soda ash to bind to the tigers then wondering why the color washes out. If the decoulorant isn't removing color it's because it hasn't been activate & it is activated by heating with an iron. That's not doing research as much as it is reading directions. Sorry to get in a snit especially if you're enjoying this play but I don't think you're giving this product a proper chance.
ReplyDeleteOh, but I did read the directions. And followed them. The directions said, among other things, to always test the product as it produces different results on different fabrics, and that is what I have been doing. I was also interested in how it would work if I had added watercolor first—which was not covered in the directions. I learned that it doesn't, which is what I wanted to know. The directions also recommend using a heat gun to activate the product, the netting with an iron. It's a good product and now I have some idea of its limitations.
DeleteThat should say "then setting with an iron"... Which is what I've been doing.
DeleteI like the way the rubbing came out. I'd probably read the DeColourant website and do my own thing anyway. But yeah, the whole point is experimenting. If we wanted to follow directions, we could've just bought a kit. (That doesn't actually help. I don't follow those directions either.)
ReplyDeleteI fed my husband 'experimental food' the other night. I ran across a menu that sounded good, realized I had most of the ingredients they talked about on the menu, found an approximation of a similar recipe and off I went. Fortunately it turned out well. Experiments can work out well!