Natural Dye Workshop at the Prague Quadrennial Article from USITT!

I am overjoyed that my Natural Dye Workshop: Sustainable Methods for Dying Textiles was featured in the Fall 2019 issue of the Theater and Design Technology Journal from USITT (United States Institute for Theatre Technology). I met the author Sabrina Notarfrancisco during the PQ festival. She spent some time with us during the workshop and captured some fantastic photos of the class in action when we were creating our natural dye samples.

You can read the full writeup here and check out the other exciting events that happened during the PQ festival.

The Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space was established in 1967 to bring the best of design for performance, scenography, and theatre architecture to the front line of cultural activities to be experienced by professional and emerging artists as well as the general public. The quadrennial exhibitions, festivals, and educational programs act as a global catalyst of creative progress by encouraging experimentation, networking, innovation, and future collaborations. Click here to find out more about PQ.

Hope you are all well!

-C

Natural Dye Workshop at Arts Underground

During the month of August I was invited to teach a workshop at Arts Underground located in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory. I packed my bags, camping gear and a few dye pots and made my way north. It took four days to reach the northern town, the drive is a must if you are interested in seeing beautiful coniferous forests, volcanoes, glaciers, snowmelt lakes, cold water rivers and arctic tundra.  

 Arts Underground is a community space dedicated to the exploration, teaching and presentation of visual arts and heritage through a partnership between the Yukon Art Society (YAS), Yukon Arts Centre (YAC), Friends of the Yukon Archives Society (FOYAS) and MacBride Museum of Yukon History. Situated in the downtown core then gallery is close to shopping, bookstores and lots of fun coffee shops. Their studio hosts a variety of workshops during the year including, painting, printmaking, ceramics, drawing and textile art. The space is also connected to a gift shop and gallery that organizes rotating shows and artists talks during the year. 

 My friend Bekah Senko was my connection to this beautiful place. Bekah has been living in Whitehorse for a number of years now and works at Arts Underground as their Programming and Communications Manager. Bekah and I were classmates in the Crafts and Design Textile program at Sheridan College. We graduated together in 2015, it was so lovely to re-connect with an old college friend. We had been in touch on and off with the hopes of running this workshop for a few years. Sharing meals and working in a studio space together again brought up many undergrad memories. 

The workshop was full with passionate textile artists and fiber enthusiasts. We worked together step by step to create dye baths from scratch using different materials like marigold, brazilwood, cochineal and logwood. Students also had fun working with a natural indigo vat that was created using a henna recipe. While samples were cooking we had the chance to practice folding, stitching and clamping techniques to help create resist patterns. 

During the workshop some students brought in their own sample books and shared their knowledge and personal experiments with the class, (my favorite part of teaching these workshops)! Some common Yukon roadside flowers that yield dye that interested me included fireweed, rose hips, northern goldenrod, pasture sage, and Yukon lupine. These plants create different shades of yellow and grey.

 Thanks to the students and the Arts Underground staff for making my trip to the Yukon so welcoming and memorable! 

You can learn more about Arts Underground through their website. Make sure you visit this great space if you ever find yourself in Whitehorse.

I will be instructing my next natural dye workshop in Calgary at Natalie Gerber’s studio space on November 2nd. In this one day workshop students will explore the natural dye pot from dye extraction and fabric preparation to dyeing.  Gain an in depth understanding of mordants and tannins while working with a variety of plant dyes obtained from petals, barks, leaves and roots.

Students will take home a personally dyed scarf, a variety of technical samples and instruction sheets to continue their dye exploration at home. Click here to sign up and learn more about Natalie’s space and the other exciting textile workshops she will be hosting throughout the year.

-C

Spotlight Exhibition at the ACC

The Alberta Craft Gallery invited me to participate in their Spotlight Exhibition during the month of October 2018.

The Alberta Spotlight Exhibition presents new and exciting work of Alberta Craft Council Members who may be launching new designs or exploring new themes.

Sending out a huge thank you to the Craft Gallery team in Calgary - Jill Nuckles and Corinne Cowell - for helping organize this exhibition and making my wares look lovely in the gallery.

And thank you to Jeff Yee for the photos!

-Caroline-

Alberta Craft Awards 2018

I am so excited and honored to share that I have been nominated for a Alberta Craft award!

When moving to Calgary from Hamilton I was pretty nervous but excited for new beginnings. I had no clue what the craft community was going to be like in the west, but I had some positive input about Calgary from my mentor in Toronto. She had visited the Alberta College of Art + Design and claimed the school was absolutely fantastic.

Finishing my BFA at ACAD was a challenging and rewarding experience, I immersed myself into the fibre department and craft community easily. The energy and enthusiasm for fresh concepts, research and creating fine craft was inspiring.

After graduating I didn’t find myself lost, I felt motivated and confident to continue my next chapter as a professional artist and crafts person. And now, I still reside in Calgary where I’ve found a new studio space and work in a field that values my education as a textile designer and dyer.

Thanks for being awesome Calgary! And thank you to my mentors, fellow colleagues and friends who support my work and future as a Canadian crafts person.

-Caroline-

Alberta Craft Gallery Spotlight

Hey Calgary!

I am very excited to share that I will be selling my work at the Alberta Craft Gallery for the month of October! Located at the ACC’s new gallery in cSPACE, you can shop my new collection of scarves, pillows and apparel. There are also lots of other fine craft items for sale in the gallery. Hope you can swing by!

-Caroline-

Fashion Revolution Week Coming to YYC!

CALGARY! Join us for Fashion Revolution Week April 23-29! This year’s campaign marks the 5th year anniversary of the Rana Plaza factory collapse, which shook the fashion world and ignited the world’s biggest fashion activism movement for a fairer, safer, fashion industry. Since Fashion Revolution started, people from all over the world have used their voice and their power to tell brands that things must change. And it’s working. Brands are listening and being more open about where their clothes are made. More manufacturers are making their factories safer. More producers are being seen and heard. But the story is far from over. We are only just getting started. We can’t stop until every garment worker who makes the clothes we love is seen, heard, paid properly and working in safe conditions. Your voice makes a difference. We need this Fashion Revolution to be bigger and bolder than ever. Join us for Fashion Revolution Week 23-29th April and ask brands #whomademyclothes? Visit maineethics.com and follow @maineethics for more information about #FashRevYYC events!

Fair Trade Fashion Showcase with Mandala Apparel

Calgary, Alberta (January 23, 2018) — Fair Trade Calgary is pleased to announce that three Calgary fashion designers have been selected to participate in a Fair Trade Fashion Showcase as part of the Canadian Fair Trade Network’s National Fair Trade Conference 2018! The three designers will complement three Vancouver VCAD student designers who will also be participating in the Showcase, which will highlight the supply chain of the material from fibre to fashion.  

These designers are taking on the challenge to create a fashion design using internationally certified fairtrade cotton weave material source from Mandala Apparels in India.

The 6th National Fair Trade Conference is being hosted at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, British Columbia from March 2 to 4, 2018.  Various sessions at the Conference this year will discuss transparency in the supply chain, handmade artisan craftmanship, and fair trade textiles and clothing.  The Fair Trade Fashion Showcase will display the fashions created by the designers, along with accompanying video and photography of the producers of the raw material, the cotton weavers, and the cutting, natural dying and sewing of the final product by the designers.

For more information on the Fair Trade Fashion Showcase, the fashion Revolution Week YYC, or Fair Trade Calgary visit www.fairtradecalgary.com.

For more information on the National Fair Trade Conference in Vancouver, visitwww.cftn.ca.

You can follow Fair Trade Calgary on social media: Twitter @FairTradeYYC , Instagram, or Facebook


Stay tuned for progress posts! 

-Caroline-

Below are Photos of the fantastic workers from Mandala Apparels who created the woven cotton yardage I will be using to create my garment. 

 

Textile Ventures in Dreamy Iceland

For the month of October I have been living in a small Icelandic town named Blönduós. This coastal town is home to eight-hundred Icelanders who farm sheep, fish and run the towns daily activities. Like many towns and villages around Iceland, Blönduós did not emerge as a village until the late 19th century. Today this town is a popular tourist stop for road trippers driving along the country's ring road.  

Blönduós is home to the Icelandic Textile Center and Museum, here I took part in the artist residency. The center aims to promote and develop Icelandic and international textiles by encouraging research and education in the field of textile art and design. The residency provides visiting students, scholars, and artists with working spaces to conduct their artistic practice, research, and study-trips within textiles. Textilsetur, is still fairly new and has been running for five years,  it's popularity among textile artists continues to grow. 

During my residency I challenged myself to work on a project that would my push me out of comfort zone... weaving yardage! Previously I had taken weaving courses during my studies under the direction of some amazing mentors. Even so, the only way to improve any skill is repetition... this residency proved ample time to stretch my weaving muscles. Not only did I choose very difficult threads to work with (fine silk and linen), I also had to learn how to work on a traditional Scandinavian loom. Previously I had worked with Jack Looms, this weaving studio only housed Countermarch looms. Working on a beautiful old loom was all part of the experience, I adjusted pretty quickly. At the end of the month I walked away with some decent handwoven cloth, and even had the chance to try my hand dying yarns with local mushrooms.

Besides the remarkable old looms, the textile center is filled with amazing women that have a strong presence in the residency and their community. One of these women, Jóhanna Pálmadóttir, the Director/Project manager of the center was raised in Blönduós and took over her families' sheep farm after studying textiles in Denmark.  Jóhanna is passionate about sheep, her country and it's history. Currently, she is heading an amazing tapestry project inspired by the Vatnsdæla saga. The forty-six meter tapestry continues to be embroidered by guests and artists. The goal of the project is to revive the Vatnsdæla saga in a modern way, while using the old traditions of handcraft. You can find out more about the tapestry and textile residency here: http://textilsetur.com/latest/ 

Upon my return to Calgary I am looking very forward to instructing a three-day natural dye workshop through Natalie Gerber's studio. In this workshop, we will explore how to create a natural indigo vat (blue), learn techniques to carefully extract madder (red), and work with the historic Osage plant (yellow). I will be bringing some beautiful Icelandic wool skeins for the occasion. Check out the "workshop" page above for more info, hope to see you there!

-Caroline-

CHROMATIC GEOGRAPHY: NATURAL DYES IN THE 21ST CENTURY

OPENING RECEPTION, THURSDAY, JUNE 8, 6 – 9 PM
PANEL DISCUSSION, FRIDAY, JUNE 9, 5 - 6 PM
CRAFT ONTARIO GALLERY
1106 QUEEN ST. W., TORONTO
SHOW CLOSES AUGUST 26th

For the majority of human history, all colour used by designers, artists and craftsmen has been obtained from natural sources. Dyes were solely derived from plants, insects and minerals, with many that were difficult to source and process, making them highly prized commodities. After a glory period for natural dyes during the early industrial revolution, which produced beautifully coloured and patterned textiles, the advent of synthetic dyes in the mid-19th century caused natural dyes to fall into disuse.

Today, interest in natural dyes is undergoing a global revival, fueled by a growing awareness of the harmful by-products of the industrial dye process, and a greater understanding of the environmental issues relating to textile production. A new generation of environmentally conscious artists and designers are exploring the use of natural dyes while re-examining regional production, often within the context of a “DIY” approach to life and work. Bioregionalism as an expression of a sense of place and cultural origin is a dominant theme, and is exemplified by the use of local dyes and traditional techniques. The rise of the local is also motivated by a desire to revive post-industrial economies and local, small-scale industries such as dyestuff and fibre cultivation. Moreover, science and innovation in commercial applications of natural colour belie dismissive misconceptions about larger-scale applications.

Chromatic Geography examines these new trends, and presents a diversity of approaches to the use of natural dyes, from scientific research and raw material development, to innovative, contemporary applications in craft, fashion, design and art, with personal approaches to materials and aesthetics.

Laura Sansone will join us for the opening reception from New York with her Mobile Textile Lab, demonstrating how to extract natural dye colour from plants. These dye solutions will then become part of the Chromatic Geography exhibition, providing a solar dye system in the front window of the gallery for the duration of the exhibition.  As well, a member of Upper Canada Fibreshed will be in the gallery demonstrating hand spinning, using Ontario-grown fleece dyed with natural dyes.

I am so overjoyed and honored to be apart of this fantastic show. A big thanks to Thea Haines and Rachel MacHenry for curating and organizing this show.  And of course a big thank you to Craft Ontario for allowing the time and space to have all this important work and conversation unfold. 

Here are some images of my work from the show. 
Thanks, Christa Guila for taking these great shots! 
 

Graduated from the Alberta College of Art and Design!

So happy to announce the completion of my BFA earlier this April. Two schools, two cities, an abundance of hard work and life long friendships. I couldn't have asked for better ride. 

New Craft Coalition Fall Sale!

Happy October! 

I will be running a table at New Craft Coalition very soon! I will be selling some special versions of my Cityscape Scarves during this show plus lots of other fun textile work. NCC has an amazing collection of makers, I am so excited to be apart of this show. Check out the other work that will be there on their website! 

-Caroline- 


 

Hamilton Artists Inc. Spring Craft Mart!

I will be selling work at Hamilton Artists Inc this weekend!
Craft Mart is a pop-up market showcasing the very best of local craft and design. Join us for a night market, Friday, June 10 during Art Crawl. And on Saturday, June 11, help us launch the Artist’s Palette Community Dye Garden with local textile artist and Craft Mart vendor, Thea Haines. The afternoon will include a community plant exchange as well as an Ecoprinting workshop with Haines where participants will use a direct method of dyeing fabric with colour from plants to create pattern and colour using dried flowers, leaves, kitchen and floral waste.

Sat, June 11 at 1:00 and 3:00 pm
Artist led workshop by Thea Haines
Ecoprinting: Bundle Dyeing with Plant Colour

Using a direct method of dyeing fabric with colour from plants, experiment and create pattern and colour using dried flowers, leaves, kitchen and floral waste.

$5.00 (material costs) Limited spaces available so pre-registration is required. Email: programming@theinc.ca

Saturday 11:00-5:00 pm
Community Plant Exchange: FREE

Bring your spare houseplants, perennials, veggies, and annuals down to Hamilton Artists Inc.'s ArcelorMittal Dofasco Courtyard and exchange/ trade/ give away plants for free with fellow green thumb enthusiasts. This exchange is open to everyone and will run all afternoon. Feel free to leave a couple, take a couple, or just stop in to see what we have!

For more information and event updates, please visit
http://theinc.ca/event/craftmart

Hope to see you there!


-Caroline-
 

New Craft Coalition Spring Show

I was this years recipient of the Alberta College of Art + Design sponsor table for the New Craft Coalition Spring Show and Sale!  

The sale happened at the beginning of May, you can visit their website here!!!

New Craft is very supportive when it comes to emerging artists. And they are just a great group of talented artists in general! 

They host two annual curated craft shows a year in the spring and the fall. Keep your eyes out for the fall show if you live in Calgary! 


-Caroline-

I will be selling work at the Common Wealth Collectors Club this upcoming weekend! Adults only, drinks and sweet sweet stuff to buy! Is there anything better to do on a Sunday? I don't think so... 

Natural Dye Workshop

I will be teaching a two day natural dye workshop during the last weekend in April. You can check out more details here (Pg 12) through ACAD's Extended Study Catalog.  It's going to be a super fun time, hope to see you there!
 

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Market Collective

I will be selling some of my work next weekend at Market Collective in Calgary! Come on out to peruse and shop for some great wares from local artist.  

Peters Valley School of Craft

Hello! I've had this website for a while now but haven't spent time posting on my blog. So here we go!  I promise that I will make more blog posts about my adventures and work! 

Here's a blog post about my artist residency at Peters Valley School of Craft! My residency took place at the beginning of the summer during May and June 2015. Peter's Valley is a unbelievable craft school located in the middle of a National Park in New Jersey by the Delaware Water Gap. I was lucky enough to meet new artists, learn new things all while being surrounded by the beautiful landscape of this northern state.

All in all, Peters Valley is a hidden gem that not enough people know about. So if you are a crafts person or artist in fiber, surface design, fine metals, ceramics, photography, wood working, or fine art this is a place you must visit.  

Check them out here. 
 

Eco Printing with Natural Dyes

Above are process shots of my first batch of eco printed scarves. 

This past November I participated in Hamilton Artist Inc's Craft Mart. These scarves were one of the items I sold at the show. 

Last April I assisted Sheridan College's Textile Studio Technologist Janelle Guthrie with her Alternative Methods of Natural Dying Workshop. In this workshop we focused on rust dying, eco printing and botanical pounding. The results were amazing and as I continue to explore these techniques I keep unwrapping the most beautiful surprises. Eco printing makes stunning surface designs and patterns.  

Working with natural dyes takes a lot of dedication and patience, I've worked with different natural dying techniques for almost a year now and I'm just beginning to get the hang of it. For my final year at Sheridan I have only worked with natural dyes and will continue to use it in my thesis work next term. 

Yesterday I read two great articles about natural dyeing, one from my prof Thea Haines and one from India Flint, I highly recommend both of them.

If you are interested in owning one of these eco printed scarves there are still some left at Hawk and Sparrow on James Street N in Hamilton. 
 

Stay tuned for more post about my natural dyeing explorations!