Fiber Artist - Another Tyvek Art Series

In the last post we featured fiber artist Paulette Lancaster and her Coral Series pieces made with Tyvek on her Art Dust blog. Paulette has done another series called the Bodice Ripper Series. She comments:

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As I placed different pieces together on my fabric it came to me that they looked liked a ripped corset. The project took off from there.

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Read more about this project on the Art Dust blog. Photos used here with permission.

Fiber Artist Working With Tyvek - Paulette Lancaster

Recently we found the Art Dust blog of fiber artist Paulette Lancaster when she posted about working with Tyvek. We asked Paulette to do a guest post about her Coral Series work and post images of some of her work. Here is what Paulette wrote about her work with Tyvek, with photos used with her permission:

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Being a fiber mixed media artist I am always on the alert for new materials to use in creating my art. Upon reading Chapter Two: Creating the Surfaces - Tyvek Film and Fabric in Gwen Hedley's book, Surfaces for Stitch Plastics, Films, and Fabric, I wanted to try incorporating Tyvek into my work. On my search for Tyvek , I discovered 10" x 13" Tyvek mailing envelopes at my local office supply store where I purchased a package.

To prepare the Tyvek, I used a pair of paper scissors and cut down one side and a cross the bottom of the envelope. Opened up it gives me a 20" x 13" piece of working fabric. I choose to use acrylic paints to color my Tyvek because of the quick drying factor. I tend to favour metallic acrylic paints because of their sheen and richness of color in my art work but my subject matter can also dictate my choices of paint color and their luminosity.

The inspiration piece in my Coral Reef Series was a hand dyed fabric that I used as the background in each art quilt. The play of colors on the fabric suggested sunlight shinning down into and through a body of water. A school of fish and a coral reef was all that was needed to complete the scene. I researched coral reefs to learn their shapes, structures and colors before I picked orange and peach colored acrylics for my coral colors. These I painted onto one side of the Tyvek and let it dry. I experimented to find the best coral shapes by cutting out pieces of the painted Tyvek and placing them between sheets of parchment paper which I pressed with a warm iron. When Tyvek becomes hot enough it changes shape rapidly. You must be vigil and check the progression of shrinkage often or you'll be left with nothing but vapour.

After arranging my selected pieces, I machine stitched them to my presewn quilt tops. Fish cut from a commercially printed fabric were wonder undered onto the quilt tops as well. Wonder Under is a fabric adhesive. Embroidery, beads and shells were used as embellishments. The quilts were finished with hand quilting and then bound.

I have exhibited my art quilts in several venues. My second art quilt in the Coral Reef Series was exhibited in the Indiana State Fair where it took a third place in the embellished art quilt catagory.

- R. Paulette Lancaster

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Many thanks to Paulette for sharing how she works with Tyvek. We'll feature more about her work in another post in the near future.

Of course, you don't have to cut up Tyvek envelopes for art work - You can always buy Tyvek online from Material Concepts in many styles.

Protecting Outdoor Sculptures with Tyvek® Covers

The American Institute for the Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works has a network blog for Emerging Conservation Professionals. This AIC blog started in May 2008 is "a forum for professionals entering the field of conservation."

Richard McCoy from the Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA) has a recent post about using Tyvek® covers to protect outdoor scuptures at the Oldfields-Lilly House & Gardens, a National Historic Landmark and 26-acre estate and historic house museum located at IMA. (Sources: IMA, Wikipedia).

Here are a couple sets of the before and after photos:

Photos courtesy of Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA), taken by Richard McCoy. Click photos to enlarge. Additional photos, videos and slide show about protecting these sculptures available at: AIC: Emerging Conservation Professionals Network Blog

On these grouds there are a number of stone sculptures that are almost 100 years old. During the winter, the museum staff wants to protect the sculptures from the elements. McCoy describes:

Historically, sculptures like these would have been covered during the winter months. The reason? Freeze-thaw-action. [T]he problem is that moisture seeps into the interstices of the stone, stays there and then after the temperature drops the water becomes ice, expands and then the little (or sometimes big) pieces of the stone get pushed apart. In short it's not good for the sculptures and we try to reduce the chances of this happening.

Why use Tyvek® for covering the sculptures? McCoy says, "The thinking was if cars could be live all year long under Tyvek covers, then our sculptures could live a good winter life under them. Of course, Tyvek is clever in that it is water resistant, yet breathable, so moisture doesn't get trapped inside the covers."

The covers were custom made and sewn to cover 9 or 10 of these outdoor sculptures. If you are thinking about doing something like this, or sewing any Tyvek® material, please refer to our Tyvek® sewing instructions.

For more information about related uses of Tyvek®, visit the Tyvek® Archival Art page of our website.

For conservators or museum staff who want to use Tyvek®, you can buy archival quality Tyvek® style 14M rolls or other types of Tyvek® rolls or sheets online from Material Concepts, an authorized Tyvek® distributor, or you can call Material Concepts to place an order: 215-338-6515 or toll free in the US: 1-800-372-3366.

Tyvek Textile and Mixed Media Art

We continue to find many artists are using Tyvek® in their pieces, particularly fabric/textile artists and mixed media artists. Artists seem to like the many and varied ways that Tyvek® can be manipulated to accomplish the effect they are striving for in their work.

Carolyn Saxby is a textile / mixed media artist in St. Ives, Cornwall in the UK. She is using Tyvek® in her work and posted photos of her textile work on her blog: http://carolynsaxby.blogspot.com/. She was kind enough to allow us to post the photos of her art on our blog. She describes this materials in this piece: "I painted and manipulated some Tyvek, heated and distressed long strips of sheers/chiffons and cut fabrics."

Photos courtesy of Carolyn Saxby Mixed Media Textile Art. Click photos to enlarge. Additional photos available at: Carolyn Saxby Mixed Media Textile Art Blog

Carolyn comments: "I love to use Tyvek in my work. Such interesting textures and effects can be achieved by heating, manipulating and distressing this versatile product! It is one of my favourite techniques and to anyone who has never tried it before - give it a go. You will have such fun!"

For artists using Tyvek in their work, Material Concepts allows you to buy Tyvek rolls or sheets online, or you can call us to place an order: 215-338-6515 or toll free in the US: 1-800-372-3366.

Tyvek Artwork - Manipulating Tyvek with heat

WOW!

We came upon this amazing work of art on Kirsten Chursinoff's Flickr page.

Entitled, Anemone Tidepool I, Kirsten writes, "The sea anemone tentacles are made with threads sewn using water soluble material. Beads and French knots represent limpets and small rocks and shells. There are also pieces of melted Tyvek and melted synthetic felt. This is another impression of the green and purple anemones (aggregate anemones) scattered about the coast of BC, Canada. Marine life provides a huge wealth of inspiration for my textile art." (By the way, Kirsten has much more information on the above picture on her Flickr page specifically detailing the melted Tyvek)

We've seen a growing trend over a few years where Tyvek is being manipulated with the use of heat. Heating Tyvek is something we can not endorse for obvious safety reasons, however, it's clearly becoming a known practice among folks working with it artistically.

For example, on Joggles webpage on How to use Tyvek Tutorial, Joggles describes in great detail how to apply heat to Tyvek to create particular effects as seen on this example entitled "Tyvek Jester" by Barbara Strembicki.

At Material Concepts, we make every style of Tyvek available in small quantities and usually have end rolls and cut offs available at steep discounts. We are amazed by the incredible artistic talent displayed by Kirsten Chursinoff, and fascinated by the information provided by Barbara Strembicki of Joggles.com.

We have seen many others who incorporate melted Tyvek into their artwork. The results are unique and quite outstanding. I have to wonder who first discovered the effects of heating/distorting Tyvek....

C'est Magnifique!