Indian Corn Circa 1994/95

Indian Corn - Haboti Silk - Acid Dyes - 1994/95  I made these panels in a beginning dye class I took with Priscilla Sage (I'm thinking around 1994 now will have to check my old class notes).

Detail

Batik Panel - Acid Dyes

Dye Painted Panel - Acid Dyes

I've yet to get around to fninshing these pieces, I've been busy excavating my studio closet and found them a little bit ago. I'm thinking they need to be encrusted with stitching and beading!

Queen Anne's Lace No. 2

Queen Anne's Lace No. 4

4x4 inches

Encaustic Medium, Pigment, Rice Paper, Ink, Found Stamp

Queen Anne's Lace No. 4

I need to reheat the surface, a pint sized customer (5 year old) tried to pick the wax off the surface, she managed to scratch it but other than that the surface was hard enough to twart her endeavors.

Wild Flowers in Wax

The wax is still warm in this shot and the rice paper buckled something fierce!

The wax has cooled buy isn't quite hard yet, the colors are darker and richer, the texture of the buckled paper worked for me this time.

4x4x2.75 inches Cradled Baltic Birch Panel
Encaustic medium, rice paper, ink, found stamp, and oil sticks

New Still Life

As soon as I can figure out a mount for it on my table, I'd like it partially propped up.

New Vinyl

There's nothing like new vinyl on my table to make me realize just how beat up the old piece was, it was 5-6 years old I think... it might have been older I'm losing track of things as I get older.  Anyway, our local WM still sells fabric so I was able to get a replacement vinyl for not too much money, which says a lot when you need 4 continious yards of the stuff!

Apple No. 1 - Blending

Blending with a stencil brush but will the line ever go away???

Apple No. 1 - Let the Mistakes Begin!!!

Line going across the fabric became very pronounced once I started applying the Shiva Paintstiks (oil bars) to the surface.  Click on the pic to see the line better.  Suggestions on getting rid of it???

The culprit that caused the line, masking tape on the vinyl, someday I'll learn to look at my surface and make sure there's no tape attached! You can see the line going directly across the fabric, follows the tape beautifully.

Now the twenty million dollar question, do I incorporate the line some how or start over?  The line travels across the top third of the apple.

Apple No. 1 WIP

Purple number one, I'm thinking of mixing the next batch of purple with some burnt umber and red.  I was hoping to finish this piece tonight, we'll see come 8pm I have some serious relaxation planned, my favorite show Fringe is on tonight.

Apple No. 1 WIP

Apple No. 1 WIP

background color number one down
48x59 inches
cotton fabric, setacolor paints

Red Apple

First layer of paint is down only 6 more colors to go to make it look reasonably realistic. This is Apple No. one in a series of three large apples.

48x59 inches

Cotton fabric setacolor paint

Still Life

An impromptu still life I set up this afternoon, in my wet studio.  I"m not used to painting flat other than fabric so I sat to paint the apple it worked out pretty well in the end, I'll finish the apple painting tomorrow.

Yesterday

Barley Tile No. 3

Barley Tile No. 3
1995
Hand Cast Paper, Pigments, Acrylic Paint

Thread Identification

Anyone know what brand of thread this is?  I bought it at Market in 2004 and have no idea who the manufacturer is aside from wanting more I need to price it out.  Light blue cones are polyester and the dark cone base is rayon. 

Prairie Bits and Pieces

Digitally printed fabric pins.

Digitally printed fabric, images are taken from my Prairie Potholes Harvest Quilts.

Embroidered compost dyed fabric pins in progress.

What I'm Up Tooooo

I'll post pictures tomorrow! Today is my birthday and I've been busy working in the studio and getting ready for this coming weekend. 

On Making a Profit

This is part of a comment I left over on Glennis Dolce's blog Shibori Girl

Interesting no one ever tells a resturaunt owner that it’s bad to make a profit, I only hear this kind of thing in the company of artists, artisans, and crafters, why???

Thermofax Woes

The light bulb burned out on my thermofax machine this afternoon, I've been doing some reading since then nad have discovered that my machine is 1. much older and 2. the light bulb for this machine is not that common!  If you have a thermofax machine you need to check the amps/volts before you purchase your bulb the bulb for the 12 amp 115 volt machine will NOT work in my machine!  Onward searching I go!

A few more brooches

Prairie bits and pieces

Been busy getting ready for this weekends show, this is just one of the brooches I've been making for this weekends show. Check out the Octagon Center for the Arts Fall Festival in Ames, IA this weekend!

Compost dyed cotton fabric
Machine stitched and embroidered
1.5 x 2.25 inches

Swine Flu Update

Well I'm recovering, finally, from the swine man swamp flu!  I still have a cough hanging on.  The canning came to a near screaching halt, John took 4 days off from work but the reality is 1. I'm more organized than he is, which isn't saying much btw, and 2. there was way more that needed canning than one person could do alone!  He did get a dozen or so pints of pear butter put up and a dozen or so quarts of tomatoes canned.  I'm feeling better but not by much, a simple drive across town  and back still wears me out and I need a nap just to recover from the experience.  To make matters worse I have a show coming up this weekend and I"m no where near being ready for the event.  More later from the kitchen!!!

Heron - WIP

I'm seriously considering ripping out the stitching on the red organza area! An idea that looked good in my head didn't work out the way I had hoped. It's rather lacking, the silk organza going wonky on the piece doesn't help matters any. 

IF I don't rip the stitching out and this is a very big IF, I may couch some yarn/fiber onto the piece in an assymetrical manner over the red stripe to correct the balance on the top right and lower left bottom. 

Prairie Potholes Harvest No. 23

I don't believe I've posted this one in the past, found it in a pile of work tonight while looking for a piece of indigo dyed rusted fabric, the fabric is still MIA.

Cochineal Cauldera

Bound resist on silk velvet, dyed with an exhausted osage orange bath and overdyed with cochineal.

Update

No pics tonight, note the time is 12:40am.  I'm in the throes of getting ready for a show next weekend and am still recovering from the swine flu, so something had to give and this time it's no pictures.

I will be vending with one of my best friends, Brenda, at the Octagon's Art Festival in Ames, IA next weekend. The name of our booth is Steampunk Prairie (she's Steampunk and I'm Prairie) so come on by to see what we've created!

Website update

I spent the better part of today updating my Art Website, it still needs loads more work, including links.
http://www.kbaxterpackwood.com/index.htm

Red Crow Embellishments

Embellishments from another piece I made in 1996, I scavanged them for this piece but won't attach them to the bottom until I'm done with the beading and stitching on the main piece.  I'm thinking of adding raw ocher to the piece tomorrow, specifically inside the crow woman section. 

Red Crow Kneeling WIP

I have some serious stitching to do now especially to the crow woman area on the quilt so that it remains the primary focale point of this piece.

Red Crow Kneeling - WIP

With a bit of embellishment.

Red Crow Kneeling WIP

Now with more stitching, on to the hand stitching and embellishing.

Red Crow Kneeling - WIP

Wonder Rust 1st layer of stitching detail.

Majorie

A picture of my mother in law taken back in 1936 somewhere in California.

Blogger

I still haven't figured out how to situate the pictures under the new blogger setup, hopefully I'll get this figured out and soon.

Encaustic Frames

Encaustic Panel

I'm serious when I say my work comes from a pet friendly home!  Baltic Birch plywood panel mounted to a 2.25 inch thick Baltic Birch Frame.  Angel tricolored sheltie.

Cochineal Vat

4 ounces of Cochineal was used to dye alum mordanted silk velvet, dupioni, and organa fabrics.

Encaustic

Oil paints that have been sitting for a day or two on paper towels.  I will use these in my encaustic panels with the beeswax and medium.  Setting the oil paint aside like this allows the paint to dry faster when it's combined with the beeswax.

Bean Field - Iowa

Blog Posts

I've been having some issues with posting for the past month. I just discovered an update, that I checked, and I'm hoping this will resolve the problem.

Cranberry Pear Sauce

Cranberry Pear Sauce.

Pears are a luxury for me as they are just priced out of my pay scale ;-) So when one of the neighbors said YES come on over and pick our trees... Cranberry Pear Sauce happens!

I typically make Cranberry Apple Sauce - known to us a saucey or sassy apples. The taste with pears is FAR superior to that of apples so if you have a glut of pears try this one side dish for a treat.

The sauce is still cooking down all told I'll have maybe 12 quarts when it's done cooking.

4 gallons cooking pears cored and stemmed (peel if that's what you like we leave the peels on for the fiber)

5 pounds frozen cranberries

5 cups sugar

1quart water

Put everything into your 5 gallon stainless steel OR enamel stock pot and cook down. NOTE we don't blend the sauce as we like it chunky OTHERWISE using your stick blender blend the sauce until it's smooth.

Process BWB quarts are 25 minutes pints 20 minutes for 1000 feet or less.