Winding and dyeing and dreaming of weaving

So I have maybe a yard of thread on the floss bobbin, of which I found I had a bunch, thanks to the downsizing.

 During its course, I not only found, but relocated, a lot of things where I can now find them with no irritated fumbling and tossing and fussing.

 To wit: the floss bobbins, exactly what I need to wind the paper yarn on, the silk dyes, which I needed instantly just now, and containers for the dyes. To name but a few.

Anyway, since it looks like I can do this thread, dyeing is up now. I took out the iris, pale green, in fact the residue from making iris paper, from the freezer, and the mix of turmeric, yellow onionskin and black walnut, too. Added in a lovely red/pink silk dye and a blue mix. The latter two are from silk dyeing days, prep for teaching freeform embroidery on silk.

I just dropped filters into containers to take up the color, then drained the excess dye all into one container and dropped more filters in there.

Here the color is spreading through the filters.

Then I needed a break, pot of tea, few cashews. And noticed the floss bobbin of blinding white thread just lying there. Clean thread, clean bobbin, the work of a moment to slip it onto a spoon and dip it into the teapot.

Seen here on a lovely homespun napkin, from a friend, don't know the weaver, or I'd credit them. Nice tint.

All in all a productive time was had by all. The containers are now in a warm place on top of the fridge to dry out. Stop me before I dye again.

This kind of art reminds you that the processing of your raw materials is part of making the art.

 The decision on how fine to make the thread, what colors to use, what to mix to get subtlety, how weaving miniature work needs the color miniaturized too.

 It's all artmaking, rather than just getting ready to make art. As warping the loom is the first part of the work, not just a process you have to get through in order to work. Or making the ink with the stick on the stone before you do Chinese brush painting. It's calming, meditative, vital.

About miniaturizing color: long ago I was a miniature needlework designer and maker, sold finished work to serious collectors, kits to keen makers.

 In the course of designing I realized that if you want to convey, say , black, as a rug background, if you use an actual black it looks toylike, not like a rug that you need comparison to realize it's not full-size. Red likewise. And so on. If the original full-size item was a solid color, the miniature version needed to be muted a bit to convey the illusion.

You can do this by mixing close shades in the needle if you're working with a plied floss, or by going into a finished work and seeding a lighter shade here and there.

This is where the craft, faithful perfect rendering in small scale, meets the art, deciding how to adjust that, so the eye sees it as a faithful rendition.  What Picasso called the lie that tells the truth.

Tomorrow I'll warp up ready for more weaving. You'll notice I'm not in a mad rush to do the finishing of the first group. Not a fan of finishing. It's like framing, you don't have to like it, you just have to do it.