Naturally dyed for Nuno felt, with Jude Craig

Jude, while not a felt maker generously allowed me to experiment with my felted samples. Prior to the workshop I worked over a couple of weeks to make my Nuno felt samples and mordant the ones done on cotton.  I was mindful of not making them too large and hogging up the dye pots. 

On the morning of the workshop, I arrived at Jude’s studio, which is only about ten minutes away from my house, with around 16 pieces, including three scarf lengths, as well as an old t-shirt to over-dye; and my favourite pieces of found scrap metal from my backyard.  I’d made some extra Nuno felt pieces for other participants Bernadette and Helen to also have a go with, if they so desired, as sharing of materials is encouraged by Jude.

We started with the wonderful aromatics of the eucalyptus bath and after lunch, the more stinky purple cabbage; as well as the pungent brown onion, after I made a request for it. I was keen to try out the eucalyptus on my Nuno samples done with cotton muslin and gauze as carriers, as I prefer working with cotton.  I’ve not had great success with Nuno felt and the eucalyptus bath in the past because of my tendency to use cotton as a carrier. But I have to also add I haven't done a great deal of experimenting. 

The eucalyptus dye pot, with some of my bundles resting outside

Nuno on cotton muslin, on left was mordanted with alum and citric acid, on right mordanted with soy. No metal was introduced with the bundle on left.  Both were popped in the euca bath.  Cured for 21 days

I had intended to take all my bundles home and allow them to rest for up to three weeks before opening.  I'm not very patient with the waiting aspect and find myself prodding and poking and willing to see what is happening within the folds of the bundles, until I can no longer withstand it and have to open and satisfy my curiosity.  Over the three weeks since the workshop, I have opened the bundles and not only been thrilled but also dismayed at the results.  However, the one thing with this natural process is that if you’re not happy you can always over-dye.    

Both samples are felted on silk carrier, the top was placed in an onion dye bath while the bottom went into the purple cabbage bath.  The onion sample was opened at the workshop, as I had used one of Jude's lovely copper scrap pieces.  I took the sample home and over-dyed by steaming, as there wasn't a leaf print to be seen.  The copper, however, had left a nice patina to the fabric

Nuno on silk, cabbage dye, left lovely blues at the edges where I had used a rusty clamp but centre of sample full of white patches

Nuno felted with merino on cotton gauze, mordanted with soy, no metal introduced into the bundle, euca bath, cured for 7 days

Nuno on cotton muslin, mordanted with alum and citric acid,  small pieces of metal used as resists, euca bath, cured for 18 days. There were a couple of white patches although the cinerea leaf left a bright orange print.  This one has been wrapped again with leaves and steamed

My favourite piece, nuno felt on cotton muslin using merino and merino silk blend, mordanted with soy, wrapped around a rusty piece of metal, euca bath, cured for 14 days. Jude had the water of the bath barely at a simmer and the bundles were allowed to seep more so than simmer  

Three small scarves, all with cotton as carrier.  On the far left I used merino as well as adding a little silk embellishment, at centre merino silk (70%) blend roving along with pure merino was felted, and at far right no silk was felted with the merino into the cotton. Although wool is said to have a natural love affair and marriage with eucalyptus leaves, I find this not wholly true, as it seems for Nuno felted on cotton, it helps to have the silk.  The centre piece yields a much lovelier sheen because of the high silk content and perhaps the scrap metal has worked a bit of magic as well 

What I have learned
Tight bundling, as well as sandwiching two pieces doesn’t work because the dye can’t penetrate between the layers. So keep your Nuno bundles loose, unless you’re steaming and desire only the leaf prints.  Jude is adamant that the introduction of metal will make for a more alchemical effect, which I have to admit is true, when I compare those pieces where I have incorporated metals to those where I haven’t.  Allow your bundle to seep slowly in the bath after simmering. This is really important for the thick layers of felt, or even for the thinner layers of Nuno. 

Soy mordant is excellent for both the cotton carrier and the silk content of my merino/silk blend roving, and it allows for a deeper take up of colour. I also tried a mixture of alum and citric acid (as suggested by Fabienne Dorsman-Rey) but think the soy superior. Fabienne told me that alum would increase the likelihood of yellows and I would lose the vivid orange of the leaves, but I didn't find this to be the case. Or perhaps it was beginner's luck. While the cabbage dye bath yields some stunning effects on silks (see Not Just Nat), for Nuno felt – even that done on silk Georgette or China silk, I found cabbage rather insipid. 

Those cabbage dyed samples wrapped again for steaming

Jude, opening her lovely silk bundles

T-shirt, onion bath, small pieces of metal used as resists were wrapped into the shirt. This may find its way into the steamer again

Detail of t-shirt

Needless to say, I enjoyed the opportunity to experiment with different dye baths without having to mess around with the brewing myself (and the yakking with the others).  As well, I was thankful for the warmth and generosity with which Jude opened her studio and shared her fantastic scrap metal collection, her collection of recyclable silk and cotton clothing from Op shops, and her knowledge on the 'naturally dyed'. Jude said something which struck me as sound when I asked her whether she'd tried the alternate soy and ash water mordanting for cottons - that she kept her method and aesthetic 'simple'. She had found what worked for silk - tight bundling and the inclusion of metal. The challenge for me is to find what works for Nuno felted on cotton gauze and cotton muslin, and as Jude, to keep the working process simple. 

Gawd (s)he copied ME. In Part 2 The Provenance of the eucalyptus leaf print

Once upon a time we had the guild system where your parent would secure you an apprenticeship with a master if you showed an aptitude for art.  If apprenticed to a painter you’d learn the skills of grinding pigments, mixing grounds, as well, drawing, painting, design, were part of your training.  Once you were proficient you could be found working on the master’s commissions and he (invariably he) would sign his name to it.  If you had any spunk and ambition, you’d break out on your own and attempt to build your reputation.  Sometimes during your apprenticeship, you might even outstrip the master, as did Leonardo with Verrocchio; and sometimes you might find yourself like Govert Flinck, stuck with the master's style and signature long after he has moved on with other explorations.  Those days are long gone and may as well have been legend or fairy tale.

These days, artists and artisans offer workshops; they write books or publish blogs and thus make a living – and their ‘customers’ pay for the privilege of attending workshops but the attitude towards apprentices has changed.  Recently I travelled almost 10,000 miles to the Creative Felt Gathering in Michigan for a workshop with Elis Vermeulen to be told ‘go figure it out for your self' (after I'd forked out several hundred dollars and the airfare).  I found myself calling on several other participants to help me through figuring it out for myself. I also listened rather nonchalantly as Elis recounted the story of a woman who had written to her expressing a desire to learn everything she (the master) knew.  The master laughed – no way was she going to show everything she knew.  What makes that so? What makes us so petty, so bitchy, so guarded, with our knowledge and expertise? Could it be that - we are women?

And then – there’s India Flint eco-dyer extraordinaire, who with scientific precision has opened up the secret world of plants and natural dyes. She will teach you how to extract dye from the eucalyptus leaf but you’re not allowed to reproduce what she teaches because it’s a signature of her ‘Prophet of Bloom’ label.  She has assumed the provenance of the eucalyptus leaf or at least, its print upon fabric.

A couple of days ago I saw on Facebook, a stunning felt coat printed with eucalyptus leaves and I instantly knew whose work it was – Irit Dulman, who achieves bold vivid colours and uses an all over individual leaf motif to stunning effect.  I’d forgotten about India Flint, until Irit reminded me of her when I asked her when she was coming ‘down under’ to teach.  Irit said, ‘India Flint would kill me’.  Why is that? Why should it matter to India Flint if Irit Dulman came this way?

It seems a lot of fibre artists interested in printing with eucalyptus leaves are afraid of India Flint.

India has written: ‘People often ask me why I teach and publish my dye techniques when clearly (if I had any business sense at all) I could make much more money by ecoprinting a snazzy range of silk pyjamas.  The answer is that by publishing I have established the provenance of the ecoprint (discovered during research for my MA) and that by teaching ecologically sustainable dye practices I’m doing what I can to make the world a better place’ ((in Felt Issue 4, p5).

Well, you don’t make the world a better place when you publicly vilify others for using the ecoprint. It's not good Buddhist practice (towards which India is inclined because of its principle of doing least harm) because you are harming that person.  More a grumpy prophet of doom and gloom than bloom, India would have been better off launching that snazzy range of silk PJs – or perhaps not teaching and publishing at all.  She could have saved herself the heartburn. Once you release the work it's out there and in this digital age it reaches people like wildfire.  The ecoprint has caught on as its methods yield fantastically beautiful prints, as well as, being ecologically friendly because you can use it on wool and silk without the addition of toxic mordants. 

Provenance (from the French provenir meaning ‘to come from’) used to refer to the chronology of ‘ownership’ for art objects to authenticate the work, though these days it’s used in a variety of disciplines, including science.  In most fields, the primary purpose of provenance is to establish or gather evidence of the object’s passage in time and space, and the person responsible for its creation or discovery.

Australian Aborigines have over 40,000 years of experience with plants, including their use as medicine and of extracting dyes for their fibre art of weaving and basketry. They don’t seem however, to have made use of the eucalyptus leaf to make a print or to extract dye, perhaps because traditionally they wore possum skins with their individual stories burned into the skin, rather than cotton or wool. (We could note that contemporary Aboriginal artists are undertaking apprenticeships with elders to learn traditional methods before these pass along with them in death.)  India Flint may indeed have discovered the ‘ecoprint’ and documented it in her thesis.  We can thus applaud her for showing us in her publications and workshops how to extract colour from the eucalyptus leaf but what we do with our extractions of colour is up to us – whether we print on paper, fabric or felt, our own artistry and aesthetic sensibilities are also at play.  India Flint doesn’t own what others make with the eucalyptus leaf print.  When we look at the history of art we see that other artists and other art have tended to inspire artists – some like Velasquez went so far as to ‘document’ his sources in his great self-portrait at court Las Meninas. He was paying outright homage to those that had inspired.  Likewise, each person who makes a eucalyptus leaf print is also paying homage to India Flint, because without her research and teaching it wouldn't be possible.  She has passed on the knowledge and you'd think she'd be pleased that there are those who can shine, as well as outshine her, with the practice. I heard an architect express those sentiments in relation to an environmentally sustainable building he'd designed.  'I hope that this building becomes outdated and that others go on to do more with some of these principles...'  An endorsement to extend on what has been given through what's been created or discovered - his 'provenance'.  Such an attitude underpins all strivings to be creative.  

We can also consider the Romantic concept of art filtered through a temperament.  Artists such as Gauguin and Van Gogh may sit side-by-side painting the same scene with very different results. There could be thousands of us working with eucalyptus leaves and producing very different ‘products’ because we are all different personalities, with different inclinations.  It's a lost cause to huff and puff on about being copied.  I find those who whine boring.  Is your own practice so stymied that you have to hang on to the provenance of a eucalyptus print or the shape of a hat or scarf? Imagine Polly Stirling claiming the provenance of Nuno felt (and there's no dispute that along with Sachiko Kotaka they discovered the properties of Nuno) and grumbling every time another fibre artist produced a piece of Nuno.  There'd be no end to Polly's grumblings. Incidentally last time I ran into Polly at a workshop, she'd been extracting colour from plants... 

My experimental piece that I keep overdyeing

I have also extracted colour from the eucalyptus leaf because it is all around me. I live under the eucalypts – what came to be called Mountain Ash Gothick in 19^th century Antipodes.  These are our cathedrals, as we don’t have the great stone masterpieces of Europe.  Our cathedrals are not only fragrant, but leave me with lots of debris, which I either sweep up for the mulcher or dump in the rubbish.  I swept up a heap of leaves and bark strippings last week, which left outside the front porch has become my puppy’s toilet area when I take her out at 2 or 3 in the morning (Maudie’s urine is possibly adding a wonderful mordant to the heap but I don’t know and don't care to explore).  When I went to the Creative Felt Gathering last year I wanted to take as gifts, pieces of my backyard, so I wrapped up several Nuno felt shawls that I’d made with eucalyptus leaves, bark and some rusty bits and pieces that I’d also found in the garden. I don’t use a dye bath but usually steam my bundles and my backyard leaves are not the Argyle Apple (eucalyptus cinerea) which give that wonderful orange tone that I love.  Oh how I envy Irit her deeply coloured leaf prints.  I don’t claim to be a master or any sort of expert.  The leaves and bark strips are around and I make use of them; but I admire those who like Irit Dulman and Fabienne Dorsman-Rey are real masters at extracting the colour from the plant - and who have made the technique uniquely their own through their individual 'expression'. That does not mean to say that the provenance of the ecoprint belongs any less to India Flint. But what stops her from saying 'I hope others go on to do more with what I've discovered'?