Mola! and a Giveaway

-
Julie Booth's theme for The Printed Fabric Bee was Mola.
Perhaps you have seen the beautiful Mola's 
created by masterful Kuna women in Panama?  
Beautiful bright colors and striking designs in reverse appliqué.
It certainly was a challenging theme to translate into paint and dye.  After studying many variations on Mola's I decided I wanted to use a bee - perhaps for obvious reasons - as the focus.  I created two stencils using my Silhouette portrait.  The first stencil was for the background (green) and the second was the bee (red). 
I started with a piece of hand dyed fabric in a very pale yellow.  Next I taped the background stencil to a silk screen and screened several colors at the same time.  
The bees were stenciled on last in black with the second stencil.
I'm a little disapointed that my bees don't look very friendly.
This is the finished piece for Julie:
Here is the giveaway piece, which ended up a few inches larger than the normal 6x6".
I had a great time making this month's piece.  It is something different for me.  There aren't layers on top of other layers.  I continued playing with this idea when Jackie Lams told me she had been having a rough month and didn't think she would get a piece done.  Jackie gave birth to beautiful BabyQ last month, and he was intensive care for some time afterward.  She and BabyQ are doing fine now but there is always an adjustment period and it's been tough.  I'm really glad I was able to continue working on this theme because I love how my second piece turned out!  After creating three stencils of leaves, lines and dots that would interconnect I started on a black Kona cotton.  I used Speedball Fabric screen printing ink in Peacock blue for the first layer.
 Speedball Blue for the second layer.

. . .and finally Jacquard Textile True Red for the third layer.

I absolutely LOVE how this one came out!
Here is what the 6x6" giveaway piece looks like:
If you would like to win these two pieces as well as the other 9 Mola inspired 6x6" hand painted fabrics made by the Beehive this month then visit Julie's Thread Born Blog
or 
The Printed Fabric Bee blog
and leave a comment!
It really is that easy!

Comments

Lynda said…
Lisa, I love your pieces this month. You are really good with those stencils and this one was a 3 parter. Wow! I need to step up my game! :-)
April 2, 2015 at 1:04 PM
Sylvia said…
Love the way both pieces turned out! I think I like the second one best. Glad you were able to help out your friend.
April 2, 2015 at 1:51 PM
Thread Born said…
Oh...I'm so excited! Both of these pieces are fantastic!...Lucky me :)
April 2, 2015 at 4:22 PM
Lisa said…
love both pieces but am especially lovin' the black fabric!!!
April 3, 2015 at 3:41 AM
Bethany Garner said…
Wow Lisa... so beautifully executed. These two special pieces are a definite example of your special connection with paints and fabric, resulting in simply stunning art cloth. Thanks for sharing the steps!
Bethany
April 3, 2015 at 8:25 AM
Carol R. Eaton Designs said…
Wow! Both pieces are wonderful! What is the tool you used on Jackie's piece to stamp on the paint? I need to find the "perfect" thing!
April 4, 2015 at 6:11 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Gelli Plate Tutorial with Leaves

-
Image
Here's the Gelli Plate Tutorial you asked for! My Gelli plate has been well used and well loved. 1. Place Gelli Plate on a flat, covered working surface, and place small dots of paint onto the plate.  My demo photos are with me using acrylics and paper but it works exactly the same with fabric paint and fabric.  I like using Jacquard Textile paint when I make fabric prints. 2. Use a brayer to spread the paint evenly across the plate. 3.  I used the leaves as a resist for the first print. 4. Place the paper/fabric on top of the printing plate and smooth it out nicely to get an even print. 5.  Carefully lift up the paper/fabric. Found a photo from when I printed the fabric - see same process. This is a first print. 5.  I know that MONOprinting means ONE print but seriously, when you remove the leaves from the plate there are these beautifully textured leaves left on the plate just dying to be printed.  I couldn't ignore them!  So this is wher
Read more

Quilt National

-
Image
My husband and I took a red-eye flight to Columbus, Ohio, and then drove the one hour to Athens, Ohio, to attend the opening of the Quilt National quilt show where my piece, Wild Flowers was being shown. Made a stop at Tim Horton's, a Canadian chain for some delicious breakfast sandwiches and donut holes. We went to the Kennedy Art Museum, on the Ohio University campus. This is the side of the building. Photo of the front of the building from the cleveland.com website. The building was designed in the 1860s by Cleveland architect Levi Scofield, and was originally part of the Athen's Lunatic Asylum. It opened in 1996 as the Kennedy Museum of Art. There were some lovely prints, paintings and exhibits. It didn't take long to tour, which was good for my knees. I was glad to be able to see this Elizabeth Catlett print. I admire her work. I've seen some of her her other prints in person, and was anxious to also see this one. Friday evening, the Quilt National show opened, and
Read more

Autumn is for the Birds

-
Image
I was thrilled when my friend Jamie Fingal ask me to create something using her new fabric line, Autumn is for the Birds, from Hoffman Fabrics. I decided to use my favorite method of creating: free form piecing.  When I create a quilt with this method I rarely plan anything out, other than perhaps a general size and a few elements.  The problem with this method is that I often have to rearrange as I go.  And sometimes I need to unpick - a LOT.  I took a few photos as I went to help me get an idea of where things were going and then based upon those photos I added or changed.  I put the photos together in a short power point so that you could see a little bit of my process.  I apologize for the dark photos as my design wall is in a dark hallway but I think it still gives you a good idea of how things went. The final quilt is approximately 30"x 37". I love the focus fabrics!  There are a lot of textures in all of the fabrics.  Honestly, I could have quilted
Read more