STUDIO TIDYING, TEABAG STAINS, CROCHET AND EMBROIDERY, AND ORGANISING A NEW PAINT BOX – ACTIVITIES DURING ONLINE ART COURSE REST WEEK
I saved this as a draft on 1st May and then forgot to publish it. I posted it on 19th May, back-dated to 1st May.
What did I do in the rest week for the pen and watercolour module?
At the end of each module, we have a “rest week” where we can either consolidate what we have done by redoing one of the projects, or do something on our own in the particular medium, or simply do nothing and have a break.
My rest week for the pen and watercolour module wasn’t exactly very restful but I achieved quite a bit, albeit nothing to do with watercolours or pen drawing!
First project: Studio tidying
My first priority was to get to grips with the dumping ground that hardly merited being called my studio any longer, as it was so untidy. I could hardly move in there. I haven’t done any actual work in it for a long time, because I’ve been concentrating on the drawing course and it’s more comfortable, and just as easy, to work from the recliner in the sitting room, with access to the TV to watch the instructional videos.
The before…
Looking at the room as it was, the task seemed overwhelming. I therefore decided to do it in very small doses, trying to put at least one thing away every time I went past the door.
Here is a view looking into the studio before I began the mammoth task.
Heaps of stuff everywhere, including a large pile of dried used teabags which are now emptied – see a previous blog post about those. I have also been going through a red ring binder (on the white pull-out unit on the right of the above photo) which contained all my Bible study group teaching acetates from the good old days when we used the overhead projector (remember those?!). All this material has now been updated, improved and digitised and the acetates were just taking up space. They were printed with an inkjet printer, and I managed to clean off the printing on the first batch by soaking them. The coating on the inkjet acetates seemed to come off really well, so I ended up with quite a lot of clean, clear acetate material for art projects – you can see some of them on top of the basket of fabric and trims on the left. However, as I began work on some more of these acetates, they seemed to have been coated with something different and this does not come off at all easily. The inkjet printing comes off with no problem but the sticky residue remains. I have tried various solvents to no avail, so the remaining acetates are probably going to end up in the bin. I am not keen on adding to landfill but I really don’t know what else to do with them. There’s only so much of this sort of stuff one can use, anyway.
There’s a stack of grey cardboard trays on the far left of the photo which I’d saved from my grocery deliveries. They had each contained four kiwi fruits. This is like egg box material, and I had in mind to use it for papier mache but I don’t know whether I’ll ever get around to doing this. They will probably just get recycled.
On the main work area is an interactive album I was working on, with an oriental theme. I dumped it all on there and covered it with a plastic sheet. I have only a couple more pages to work on before the project is complete, and I think this will be one of the first project I work on once I get back in the studio. There are a lot of charms, paper scraps, scrap book papers and ephemera there, and once the pages are completed, what remains will be stored away in their appropriate boxes.
Looking over to the far side of the room it was just as bad.
I have had several projects on the go over the past months. My “bonnie baggie” project, making neck purses and small bags from upcycled fabrics and trims, has more or less bitten the dust, at least for now. I shall definitely be returning to this in due course, but in the meantime, I put away the trims, ribbons, beads and fabric scraps in their respective storage boxes. I can always get things out again when I resume this project. There are also larger pieces of fabric (curtains) ready for upcycling, and all the stuff over by the sewing machine, relating to my second Victorian-style apron. I am still working on the embroidery for that one, and this is something I am doing from the comfort of the sitting room.
On the pull-out unit, there are several boxes of hair colour which I no longer use, and which got dumped in the studio when I was tidying my bathroom boxes recently. I had thought of using them to colour paper or fabric but having done some research into this, it appears that it is not recommended as the stuff in these products is designed specifically for hair and will not be stable enough for mixed media art. The boxes are all unopened and I am reluctant to throw them away! (I have subsequently given them to my cleaning lady and she said she would offer them around the girls on the team, so I am sure nothing will go to waste.)
The after…
Quite an improvement, I think you will agree. It has also given me a great sense of satisfaction. I have learnt a lesson about such a mammoth tidying operation – it is much better to tackle one small area at a time and then walk away. Looking at the whole room is totally overwhelming and one tends to close the door on it once more, and put it off because it just seems too much to deal with.
A montage of the before and after shots.
I do need to have another major blitz in there and get rid of stuff. I have boxes of things that I know I am not going to do any more – various crafts and projects which I thought would be interesting but proved to have no future in them for me. I can then free up some more boxes for the things I am really interested in.
Second project: Teabag staining
This is the subject of my previous blog post.
Third project: Crochet and embroidery
I’ve resurrected the embroidery for my second Victorian style apron.
I’ve also made a few more octagons for the Persian Tiles crochet blanket. (Ruby helping.)
I’m over half way through this project now, at least with the large octagon motifs. There will be granny squares to go between them, and then the border to crochet.
Fourth project – Colour wheel
Phil, the online art teacher, suggested a simple little project to prepare us for the next module of the course, which is coloured pencils. This was to create a circle, blending three different colours.
Since I had recently drawn my own colour wheel, using my Derwent Coloursoft coloured pencils, I haven’t done this little project, but I think I can justify including my version in the rest week activities!
I recently bought a two-part colour wheel with stacked revolving discs – quite useful for choosing colour schemes, colour mixing, and understanding primaries, secondaries and complementary colours etc.
Fifth project: Watercolour box sorting
My hubby has very generously given me one of his old paint boxes. It is a tin which holds 2 rows of 12 half pans, and has two fold-out palettes. The colours were not complete and he has also given me some watercolour paint tubes (which he doesn’t like using) which I am going to use to fill some empty pans which I have on order. I have rearranged the existing pans in the order of the colour wheel, with the blacks and browns and neutrals at the end, leaving spaces to fill with the new pans when they arrive, and I have started making a swatch sheet which I shall laminate and keep in the tin.
So – I have not exactly been idle in the “rest week”! It’s actually been more like a fortnight than a week, but who’s counting…
