Leaf Stamping

While the rust and mud pieces were 'batching' this weekend, I did some printing with leaves. A couple of things I discovered... it's really hard to get all the leaves to behave and lay nice while you put the dye on them! They want to twist and flop around... had to really work hard to get them to stay put! I tried rolling the dye over the leaves onto the fabric, then took a piece of fabric and laid on top of the dye covered leaves and gently pressed to transfer the dye. A couple of the images -- the spirea branch and the poplar -- really transferred well. Not so with the red-twig dogwood, and the sunflower simply wilted before I could try it... maybe next time!


Here are the results:

Below is the Spirea


I really like it, and the Poplar... lots of good detail


The one below didn't get a real good print of the leaves, but the rolled on dye kind of looks like a tree trunk to me! And if you're wondering about the white dots at the bottom, I have a roller pan with raised dots that leave an imprint on the roller, which transfers nicely to whatever I'm dyeing!


This last one is a kick! It is actually the backside of a piece where I was heavy-handed with the brown dye. It looks quite muddy from the front, but on the back, the branch structure came out nicely, and the faded colors look a little like mist or fog to me.



I can't wait to work these into a composition! More to come...