Pigment Discharge

We recently decided to try printing the warps with pigment discharge. Warps were dyed and test pastes arrived for sampling. The warps were printed, woven and  heat pressed to activate the chemicals. Some of the fabrics and ideas achieved were quite unusual and beautiful. 

 

 

Examples of Abbotsford pre and post weaving.

 

After finishing the small warp and feeling excited by the results, I moved onto a larger warp using five different colours. The purpose of this was to create a blanket that could be cut up into samples, it is intended to demonstrate the effects of one ink colour on top of different coloured warps. Various wefts would be introduced to explore change further.

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the biggest problem I have been faced with, threads sticking to the table and pulling the glue off with them when the warp is rolled back onto the beam. Detangling them before they meet the headles on the loom takes up most of my time when weaving.

 

 

 

Geometrics

I wanted to try contemporary designs that werent necessarily associated with the shadow tissue process. I have always been attracted to repeats, lines, blocks and traditional weave structures such as chevrons and houndstooth weaves.

 

 

 

 Anni Albers

 

Gunta Stolzl

 

I looked at many possible patterns and a set of rudimentary trial screens were made for testing, these focused on twill variations and a houndstooth design.

 

 

 

 

 



Viscose Warp

After working on Abbotsford for so long, I decided it was time to step back for a moment. I wanted to try some different yarns and patterns. The trip to the achive inspired me to explore more contemporary deigns that I had found there as well as some geometric type designs.

 

 

Abbotsford 3

 

After conversations with Philip At Turnbull Prints, we decided to try out a couple of new methods or techniques. The first was to see if we could print two layers of threads at once. So a warp was folded over and screens laid on top. This wasnt successful in terms of colour penetration and there was too much movement in the threads, although the effects werent appropropriate, interesting marks and patterns were created.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was having a few problems with the dyes clogging up the warp threads during weaving. So it was suggested I try using mercerised cotton rather than raw. This worked extremely well, carried the colour better and soaked up the dye more evenly. Breakages were still occuring but not as much as previously.

 

 

We also spotted faint stipes in the background of some shaow tissue samples from the archive so I decided to try this too. Stripes were evenly and randomly spaced.