Fall in the native wildflower garden is time to gather seeds to share with others. I had many seeds to share. I divided them up into small bags and labeled them.
I made several accordion books to house the seed packets. I found images of old seed packets to use for the front and back covers.
I decorated the backs of the accordion with images of native wildflowers.
I recently took an Eco-printing on paper course from the The Lansdowne House. Eco Printing is a technique that uses heat and humidity to create prints from natural objects (leaves, bark, flowers, etc). The heat and humidity is created by simmering or steaming the paper while in contact with the natural objects. Mordents, tannins, and dyes are used to enhance the prints, either in dye baths or blankets.
I printed on 100% cotton cold pressed watercolor paper and scoured fabric (cotton and muslin). The paper and fabric were briefly dipped in Iron water mordent just before being used. The Southern Sugar Maple and Ginkgo leaves were collected from my yard the same day as they were used. My dye bath was made from Purple cabbage the day before.
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I recently attended a hands-on workshop on natural dyeing process at OCAF, led by Beatrice Brown. Bea is a local fiber artist whose work I have admired for several years and I was very excited to take this class. During the workshop we extracted dye from natural materials, made dye pots and dying recipes for use with fabrics (cotton, linen and silk). We also learned about mordants, tannins, dyes and color shifting using metallic salts. Because this was only a two day workshop, the fabric was previously prepared for our use, meaning it had been scoured and in some cases mordented.
Vegetables we used to make dyes:
Ground pigments we used to make dyes:
Most of our dyes pots were simmered for 1 hour (some required some boiling or room temperature soaking). The dye bath was cooled and the liquid decanted into glass jars. To some jars we also added Ferrous Sulfate, Tannin, Alum, soda ash, baking soda, citric acid, cream of tartar, calcium carbonate or salt. The pot on top has Avocado pits. The two pots on the bottom have yellow onion skins and purple onion skins.
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We spent a few days on Ossabaw Island learning about their Turtle program and the island's ecology. This is the largest barrier island on the Georgia coast. It has thousands of acres of salt marsh, fresh and salt marshes, and several miles of undeveloped beach. The island was designated as a heritage preserve in 1978, by Governor George Busbee.
There are several buildings on the north end of Ossabaw Island. The Boarding house and Club house are used for visiting groups. The historic tabby houses built in the early 1800's which have been carefully restored. This is also where the small herd of Sicilian donkeys are often seen.
Five species of sea turtles are found in the waters off Georgia’s coast, but only one, the loggerhead sea turtle regularly nest on Georgia barrier islands. Turtle researchers spend most of their time cruising the beach looking for turtle tracks made by adult females coming ashore to nest, and hatchlings scampering across the beach to the ocean. They work from sundown to sunrise. Early one morning we met one of the researchers on South end beach and were able to watch two recovered hatchlings head out to sea. This beach has a extensive Ghost forrest of hauntingly beautiful trees.
There are extensive salt marshes along the western side of the island. I used these photos as references for a watercolor in my field notebook.
Sapelo Island is one of my favorite places to visit. The large live oak trees, vast marshes and empty beaches are sublime. It is worth the effort to get up early to catch sunrises on the beach.
We had the opportunity to visit Little St Simon's Island for a Georgia Audubon 3 day Ornithology workshop. We had a wonderful time helping the researchers band Painted Buntings (and other birds); count nesting spoonbills, storks, ibis, herons, egrets and anhinga in the rookeries, and checking on nesting sea birds at the beach.
While on a trek up the beach to see Wilson Plover chicks and American Oystercatcher nests we notices a bouy that had washed ashore. I took several photos from different angles as references. I used a panoramic photo for the watercolor sketch in my travel journal.
Transparent Watercolor on Paper and experimenting with Mixed Water Media on Yupo, a workshop by Mark Mehaffey. This workshop was offered as part of the 2022 Georgia Watercolor Society's National Exhibition held at OCAF.
It was three day zoom workshop. During the workshop he provided us with information on his painting methods and techniques. We were able to ask questions and share our work-in-progress for critique and assistance. We looked at some of Mark's paintings as part of our discussion. I would describe the paintings as abstracted realism. We spent time on planning our paintings. Using exercises to help us develop the relationship of the shapes, color values. I learned a lot from the workshop.
Value studies:
The first watercolor painting was done on heavy watercolor paper with two coats of gesso. This treatment adds texture and allows easy lifting of paint. To preserve the paint a sealing coat is sprayed on the painting. I used a photo of the Grand Tetons from a trip several years ago as my reference.
This watercolor was done on Yupo, a plastic paper that allows paint to easily flow across the surface. Paint can also be quickly removed with water. To preserve the paint a sealing coat is sprayed on the painting. These are total abstracts.
For this OCAF class a small group of plein air artists ventured out to some beautiful local gardens to sketch and paint. We all gathered at the appointed location in the morning. We started with a brief introduction by the garden owners. Then spread out across the garden, each looking for an inspiration to paint. While we were painting the instructor Jack Burk moved around asking us about our painting plan and making helpful suggestions.
Plein air items I brought to the gardens:
We visited a historic working farm that had walled gardens and beautiful old buildings and trees. An old tire swing beyond one of the older wooden buildings caught my eye. It reminded me of a painting done by Teresa Dean that featured a tire swing in the front yard of a farm house.
While cleaning up my studio, I ran into two Books by Hand photo albums kits (1 Ribbon-bound Photo Album and 1 Post-bound Photo Album). I bought them several years ago when I first began learning about book making. Since I have been making more book board books recently I thought it was a good time to use them. Both are “Just-the-pieces” kits. Meaning they included instructions; cut, punched and scored pieces of book board and pages. They do not include book cloth or decorative paper. This gave me an opportunity to use some of the marbled paper and book cloth I already have. I liked how the photo albums turned out. The directions were clear , and having the pre-cut book board and pages made it a fun quick project.
I constructed the Ribbon-bound Photo Album first, then the Post-bound Photo Album. Most of the steps are similar.
For the ribbon bound photo album:
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| Finished back of ribbon bound photo album |
For the post bound photo album:
Steps 1 through 4 are the same. Step 5 is slightly different. Following the kit’s directions, book cloth and decorative paper are glued to the inside of the front cover. This process was repeated for the back cover.
The block is then attached to the front and back covers using the provided metal screw posts.
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| inside front cover showing post attachment |
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| Finished front of post bound photo album |
