Natural Colours: The idea behind

"NATURAL COLOURS" is about CHEMISTRY, COLOUR and NATURAL SOURCES.

 

All the little creatures that form Natural colours installation has been needle felted...

...with white wool. Here a picture of an Irish sheep from Donegal.

And they have been dyed afterwards with common vegetables. Vegetables that can be found in your kitchen or back garden.

As a yellow dye, I used the skin from the onion. Because I am Spanish and my boyfriend is French, at home there is a lot of cooking that involve onion. For the last two month, I had a shoe box in my kitchen where I kept the skin of the onion. Then I just added them to a pot with hot water, I added my woolly creatures, and after 1 hour, all was yellow!

Red cabbage is my favorite dye. By changing the pH (adding acid or basic substances) you can change the colour.
Just chopped red cabbage and hot water gives a nice purple dye. The woolly pieces need top stay overnight.

By adding a basic substance as hand soap or soda, the purple dye will change to green!

But by adding an acid as lemon or vinegar, the purple dye change to pink. Almost magic!

Teas are great dyers, too. Raspberry and cranberry tea give a lovely red.

Natural colours can be used as water colours (if working with very concentrated and thick solutions); or as a dyers for yarn, felt, cotton, fabric... (just remember to rinse well at the end); or to colour your natural play dough!

Finally, Natural dyeing is about experimenting, transforming, creating and most important: about fun and excitement! 

"Meet the Lichens' world": the book

"Meet the Lichen's world" is the book that support "Lichen" installation. If you want to discover 19 funny and interesting facts about Lichens have a look to this beautifully illustrated book. (Click on Book Preview)

Meet the Liche...

They are everywher...

By Natzaret Sindreu B...

Book Preview

Text by Natzaret Sindreu Box
Designed and illustrated by Riccardo Cereser

Lichen

"Lichen" is the second installation commissioned by the ARK. It is an artsicence installation about texture, colour and environment. The installation include an illustrated book with information, facts and curiosities about Lichens; and three large handcrafted tactile wall placed around 3 columns, made from felted wool, silk and other textiles. The pieces are inspired by Lichen's colours and textures. Nature, Our Environment, Sciences and Art converge in "Lichen", blending the four elements in one and smoothing the borders between them. From an artistic perspective the installation focus on colour and texture, stimulating sight and touch. From a scientific perspective, the visitor is introduced to the fascinating world of Lichens. The installation aim to help the visitor to recognise and identify Lichens; to encourage the visitor to look for them in trunks and branches and use them as environmental indicators.

Enjoy the video!



Video Filmed and edited by Riccardo Cereser (www.rikishere.com)
Music:"Robot Anthem Part II" by Learning Music (http://www.learningmusicmonthly.com/)

Natural Colours

Natural colours is one of the installations that I made for The ARK.

It consists in a serie of colourful hanging pieces.

The pieces has been distributed between two wood walls at the entrance of The ARK.

They consist in cute creatures...

...created from the repetition of balls, different sizes and colours.

The installation is aimed to a young public, children from 2 and 12 years.

The pieces are needle felted with wool and dyed with natural colours from vegetables.

The installation focus on number, shape, size and colour for the youngest ones...

...and pattern and chemist for the eldest ones; as natural dyeing is a pure chemist process were acids and bases play an important role.

Two commissions for The ARK

If this blog has been unattended it is because I have been extremely busy working in two commissions for “Awaking curiosity” exhibition, organised by The ARK in Temple Bar, Dublin.

Early this year, The Ark was looking for installations that fusion art and science.

Considering that I define myself as a Scientist with a passion for Textile Crafts and Nature. And since 2010, I combine my job as a Chemist with Feltmaking. “Awaking curiosity” was just the perfect project for me.

I submitted two proposals, and both were selected. Now finished ans installed!

1)“Natural Colours” is about natural dying with common vegetables.

2) “Lichens” is inspired by the colours and textures of Lichens found in the Nature.

It is the first time that I am working with large installations and that caused few logistic troubles.

First, I need to get my 800g of "Savon de marseille" with olive oil. It is the best and quite cheap in France. My boyfriend bought in his last trip.

Second, I needed an Studio. So, our guest room was converted into a Studio. The bed was removed and a large IKEA table was assembled with big boxes under to store all my wool. The Studio was perfect, south facing, nice light.... But when we had guests, we gave them our bed and we need to sleep on the floor!

Awaking curiosity is running from the 14th of May until the 6th of August. The first six weeks it is opened to schools groups; and since the 23rd of June, it will be opened to all public.

Keep an eye on this blog, I’ll post more pictures and Information!

New book!!! "Profiles in Felt" and I'm in; so exciting!!

Last Friday evening was the launch of ‘Profiles in Felt", the first Feltmakers Ireland book.

 It is a collection of the work and stories of 44 feltmakers in Ireland. Each work is different, reflecting the wide flexibility of feltmaking

I'm in page 77 & 78. The two pieces that I choose for the book are my kinitting giraffe and a pixi sitting in a branch with two mushrooms. The two of them needle felted, of course!

It is a beautiful and inspiring publication.

Here you have my story:

" I work as a Scientist but textile crafts have always been my passion. My love of handmade craft goes back to my childhood in Barcelona, where my first teachers were my wonderfully talented grandmother and mother. They taught me sewing, embroidery, knitting, crocheting and macramé. In 2007 I moved to Ireland, a lot of things changed in my life. Ireland offer me the opportunity to invest seriosly in craft. In 2008 I opened my on-line shop on the selling plataform Dawanda. At that time my work was crochet or sewn pieces, I sell gifts and accessories for adults and kids, at the beginning they were crocheted or sewed. It was thanks to some German craftmakers from the same selling platformthat I discovered  felting; this was new for me and I was amazed. I am a self-taught felt maker. I took to needle felting from the beginning.

Detail, colour, simplicity and texture define my style. I concentrate on sculpting small, detailed three dimensional figures. My products are fun  and childlike.My inspiration comes from the materials themselves, my admiration for Nature and my childhood memories. For me it is essential to work with natural materials like wool. In a society constantly running against the clock, I like to invest all the necessary time to make individual and unique pieces to a very high level. I like the playful side of wet felting and the intuitive side of needle felting. Needle felting is a fun art with a wide range of applications, that suits my lifestyle. It is natural and ecofriendly; very little is needed, just few tools, a small table and lot of imagination.
I feel that I’m just at the beginning. There is so much to do that I will need a life-time to achieve it. In 2010 I joined Feltmakers IReland and then started teaching needle felting which I really enjoy. I do wish to keep teaching, especially in other countries as I speak French and Spanish. I would like to do larger pieces and submit to exhibitions. And maybe one day I will be able to live from my carft; my boyfriend and I have a dream to live suistanibly from our garden and craft in his house in the French country side."

Nuno felted dresses with Charity Van der Meer!

I'm so proud of my nuno felted dress!!

I made this dress in a three days workshop organised by FeltmakersIreland. The teacher was Charity Van der Meer, an amazing fashion design from Zambia but living in Holland.

She works with just one layer of extrafine Merino on silk ponge or chiffon. (I used red chiffon).

She has up to 50 % of shrinkage and lays the fibres on the direction that she wants the shrinkage happening. That's how she shapes the dress. (It's hard to belive that you can get a dress from that, isn't it?)

From the same pattern we got many different dresses and jackets.

Mine is pure colour madness! I had a very busy time recently and I planned to buy my wool the week before the workshop, but plans changed at last minute and instead of been in Wicklow buying my wool and silk I finished in Connemara hillwalking and kayaking against the wind!! So, for my dress I just took all the wool and fabrics that I had at home: three different greens, reds, whites and blacks!!

I paniked a litlle bite, I didn't know how to put all together without looking like a clown. Thanks to Clodagh who carded all the wool together for the tops, bringing all the colours together beatufully and thanks to Charity who helped me with the surface embellishment.

I'm very pleased with the result, but I hope that it's the last time that I left the shopping for last minute!!

The dresses are so nice to wear, they adapt to your body, just showing the best of you!! And moreover they are reversible!! What else can you ask to a dress?

Check here and here to see more of Charity's work. It's just faboulous!!