Most of my artwork uses waterproof materials as otherwise half of what I had placed down would ‘melt away’ each glaze. Despite this, I’m finding I am still on a learning curve regarding what materials are waterproof enough to withstand machine washing.
I’m sure when Andrew suggested we make a quilt he didn’t think I’d be turning up with an assortment of fabric pieces asking for them to be test washed!
I had some failures. I had some victories.
Faber Castell PItt Pens
A stalwart of my painting to date, these have never bled ink on me in subsequent glazes. Still, I wanted to test the ‘permanence’ of this permanent marker before I got very excited with my quilt drawing. The Pitt Pen didn’t say to heat seat it prior to washing. I decided to iron one test piece anyway and discovered it fared slightly better than it’s non-ironed counterpart.
Caran D’ache Neocolor I
Another art supply I use frequently, Caran D’ache’s wax oil pastels are fantastic in glazed artwork (neocolor I, that is… I do wish one day the colour range you can get in the water-soluable neocolor IIs would be extended to the non-watersoluable variety). To test it out for the sewing machine, I used a Cedar Canyon rubbing plate (designed for use with Shiva Paintstiks). I then went over part of the design with Golden Medium GAC 900 and left part as is. I ironed all of it prior to washing.
Here is the result. The piece unprotected by the GAC 900 has all but vanished! The GAC 900 does leave the fabric with a ‘wet patch’ look about it but I figure if I paint the entire panel, no one would notice. The alternative is to put the medium straight into paint (unfortunately I haven’t figured out how to use a rubbing plate with paint yet!)
Golden Fluid Acrylics
The word Alice has been painted using a mix of Golden Fluid Acrylic and Jo Sonja Textile Medium. I’m sure Golden’s GAC 900 medium would work just as well, I just couldn’t find it at the time!
Shiva Paintstiks
I’m not going to show you a picture of the piece with Shiva Paintstiks post-wash. I ironed it. I let it dry for days. I didn’t iron it a second time. Some of it decided to leave during the washing process. I’ve since read an excellent tutorial on using Shiva Paintstiks from This is My Brain On Quilts. I plan to have another go!
Lumieres
Lastly, I couldn’t have a piece on paint on fabric without mentioning Lumieres. If I didn’t already own so many other paints, I think I’d just use Lumiere and Neopaque. I washed the pieces and I cannot tell the difference from the pre-wash photographs. Good news really, given the entire tree is painted in Lumiere Bronze metallic.
An Updated Photo
Please forgive the photo quality.
Thanks to a long weekend, I’ve managed to make significant progress on piecing together the quilt. At the expense of housework of course!
PS: If you are wondering what that yellow line is near the bottom it’s the start of a swirl. It’s handstitched in thick silk. The photograph below shows a much smaller spiral which has been stitched in that lower right hand corner. The thick silk is hand dyed from The Thread Studio. I’ve already run out of the purple so will have to get some more!
