Unit 1 (C & D) Arts Research: Arts in the community, silk painting

 Silk Painting:




For the arts research section I helped out a friend of my mother’s, Samia, who does silk painting. Silk painting is one of the techniques of textile printing that I want to cover for my silver arts award (in some section or other). 
   
Samia was holding a workshop as part of the celebrations for the opening of a local health clinic, the workshop was for all ages and we were working to create silk panels with the theme of the rainbow. Each panel had certain details worked into it besides just a set colour palate. For instance; the first one, red has a Pheonix on it.

The steps to silk painting are very simple and easy to follow, which is what makes it such a wonderfully easy yet excellently satisfying past time. First you trace your design onto the silk (which needs to be very light, very pure and preferably white) with gutta. Which does essentially the same job that wax does when used in water colour paintings, stops the paint, like a dam. Once that has dried you can begin using the actual coloured paint, or dye, depending on what you call it. You don’t need much, mixing a few drops with a small jar of water will get you a rather strong colour. When applying the paint use a soft brush and dab a little into the middle of the area you want to colour, the paint will then leach out to where you marked the silk with the gutta and shouldn’t cross beyond that point.

In addition to just painting you can sprinkle salt onto the wet paint and it creates something like a marbling effect. Different types of salt will give different patterns. The first one happens to remind me of snowfall on mountains and the second stars.

I had massive amounts of fun doing this, and would recommend it to anyone who wants to create something that looks really beautiful! This is now on display in the afore mentioned health clinic in Wallington.
 Below you will find a link to a video of an interview I did with Samia.

Video