COMPONENTS OF MY NEW "DIRECTION"...

I am having such a good time painting on fabric that I wanted to show you the simple tools needed and to encourage you to try it!

Here, spread out on the next piece of fabric to be painted, are the tools I use to create texture and shape in the colors. The comb is dragged through wet paint and makes ridges. The chopstick is used to draw simple lines through the paint. I put some paint in the red plastic lid and use the now well worn sea sponge to create lace- like designs. That big wooden spoon continues to get bigger! I use it to scoop paint out of the cans and spread it around on the cloth. I wipe it off on the cloth, but not totally , so it continues to get fatter and fatter with paint. There is almost a giddy feeling when I use the spoon and leave paint on it! You know all those rules about cleaning your brushes and paint sticks and paint can rims? I DO clean my brushes, but the rest of the rules do NOT reside in my studio. And, no one is looking over my shoulder saying tsk, tsk, tsk. Really quite fun! As an aside to this reckless approach to paint, I now have a pair of "painting jeans". Yeah, they have paint on them and its great! The best tool in this picture is the yellow plaster trowel, which lost its handle long ago but is absolutely perfect for smearing around large globs of paint.

Here are a very few of the small bottles of acrylic paint. Remember that long ago post showing all my shelves of paint bottles? Many of my paints are running low and getting a bit stiff and unusable for fine line painting. But, if I add some warm water and give it a good shake, it is perfect for dripping and pouring over the surface. These are some of the cans of house paint I am using as base colors. And, finally ...........this is a stack of different colored pieces of painted fabric, hanging out there, waiting to be transformed into a handbag, or a tote, or maybe a piece of wall art, or an insert panel on the back of a jacket, or patches on a cool pair of jeans, or.........(you fill in the blank here) !! Now you know exactly how to do it. Go paint some fabric!