I am super excited about the experiments I did with local foraged seaweeds on silk fabrics. I hadn’t done any research on the topic and just followed my gut instincts and my small amount of knowledge on eco printing and dyeing. I chose red seaweeds and a gorgeous tactile piece of kelp for this. The walk along the beach was almost meditative, a glorious day with sunshine warming my face and an abundance of seaweed after a recent storm to choose from. Gratitude.
I simmered the raw materials in a water and white vinegar solution while the seaweed was cooking in a large a pot to extract the colour. I added the silk ribbons to the seaweed pot underneath so they picked up frond imprints and just soaked the cocoons in a small bowl of dye until they showed signs of having had enough time immersed, these were then placed in the microwave for 2 minutes.
Next I laid out my fresh seaweeds on a length of beige silk dupion, folded it in half and rolled it onto a tin can, binding it up with string made from an old t-shirt. This was then added to a pot of iron water and rust water topped up with fresh water and simmered for around 1 and 1/2 hours. The subtle and beautiful imprints left on the silk were so amazing, I was thrilled to bits. I left them for a couple of weeks and there doesn’t seem to be any fading so I remain hopeful they are not fugitive.
red seaweeds dye extracted on silk habotai and silk cocoons, red seaweeds and kelp printed on silk dupion.
Nature has so much that excites me as a textile artist and I know this is a love affair only beginning. We have several beaches within 2 kilometres and with the Wild Atlantic we are blessed with lots of seaweed.
Check out my next post about using mushrooms to create spore prints.
Karima Rebecca Powell Artist 