High Temps = Painting with Salts Again

This is the beginning picture of what the first piece today looked like. It dried very dark but is washing out quite a bit now. We shall see tomorrow what the pieces look like! Double click on any of the photos to see them closer!

Another really hot day out there today and the sweat was pouring off my forehead as I applied dyes and salts to a 2 yard piece of fabric out in the driveway!.

This time, I kept the mixing red and golden yellow at 5% but mixed the turquoise at 10% and the intense blue at 6%. I also mixed up a batch of grape at 10% as I haven't tried that yet. I decreased the concentration of the mixing red to about 4%. Usually about two cups of dye gets applied to a 2 yard piece. Of course first I spray it all over with urea water as it is easier to apply the dyes when the surface is a little damp.

The first piece was golden yellow on first and then sponged with turquoise and mixing red. I let it get close to dry and then nuked it for about four minutes and I am letting it sit out on the line to get dry. It is quite a humid day and there is probably enough moisture to keep things going a bit although the quick microwave will probably be enough heat to get it going.

The second piece was grape and turquoise and mixing red. There was quite a bit of movement. The grape was a very high concentration but still doesn't seem to have that much color to me.

The third piece was just intense blue and turquoise. The intriguing part was that there was very interesting movement of the intense blue even before I put on the turquoise and salt. It looked like feathery fireworks. I may just do a piece like that to see how it dries.

Figured six yards was enough for today! I have covered up the second one with black plastic and then did the third piece right on top. I will nuke them both before I rinse them out!

It is very obvious to me at this point that the higher the concentration of dye, the more effect you get so I won't be shy about using my "Ann Johnston" concentrations of dyes (10-12%) which gives you the beautiful bright colors!

The next three are the absolutely stunning hibiscus that we have blooming in our front yard. There are tons of new flowers each day in salmon and red/orange. We got these at KMart and didn't see any flowers for the first month. They love this hot weather!