Research on Whalley Range

So, for my sustainable India research, to see if could get my hands on some hessian rice sacks, and get some primary photos of indian attire, I made a trip to Whalley Range. There is also a shop in Bradford called Bombay Stores that sells hand made indian designer attire, so when I went for my interview, I decided to go there and see if I could take some pictures, but photography wasn't allowed in the store which was really annoying because I just wanted to use the images as primary research. The same thing happened on Whalley Range. The shop owners probably thought I was going to steal their designs, despite me explaining myself that it was for a college project and that I could get them some free advertising in the exhibition, but they were adamant that photography was not allowed. There were only 2 shops that let me take photos, but the problem with that was that the suits were not hand made. The reason that I wanted to take photos of clothes that were hand made and had hand embroidery on them was because I want to do some embroidery on my piece, and Indian hand made clothes are lavishly full of zardosi, beads and glam. I would like an element of this to be in my piece - whatever that may be. 

As well as going to the clothes shops, I went to the Asian cash and carry in the hope that maybe they would be able to get hold of some sacks for me, and if not, at least I would be able to take some pictures of the rice and flour bags so I could get hold of some hessian and using the photos create a design to print onto it with. This was one of the parts of my trip that was successful. I also went to a take away and asked them to save me some flour and rice bags. I didn't really expect them to put any aside for me, but when I went back a couple of days ago, they had put 5 aside for me, which was really helpful. This has also helped me think about my colour scheme a bit more. I have thought about it and have decided that I want to use blues and purples as my colour theme. Most of the bags that I have managed to collect are of different shades of blue and purple. This will help develop my experiments and refine them towards my final piece. 

These are the images from the cash and carry of flour bags. I went in the hope of finding hessian rice bags but they didn't have any, and I took these images in case I didn't find any rice sacks, I could use the material used to make the rice bags and turn these into prints. 

Creating Designs for Screen Printing

Due to a power cut, the printers were down so before I could even start thinking about screen printing, I had to wait for the system to be up and running. I picked out a selection of photos that I wanted to use to create the designs which consisted of some of the photos of flowers and some of the India photos as I want to incorporate the architecture of India in my design too. It was trickier than I thought it would have been, as I wasn't really sure about how to combine the two very different themes so they would flow together on one screen. Danielle suggested I keep them on separate screens, and instead of doing a measured repeat, finalising the position of the images when printing. I found it difficult to come up with a design in this way and I was out of my comfort zone, and I couldn't see how the different images on the different screens would come together.

I wanted to create the design on the same screen in a composition so I would be able to see how the print would look before I did it, but for this, it wouldn't work so I have to just do things as they come up. I won't know what the print will look like until I do it, and start layering the different images up starting with lighter colours and building them up using darker colours perhaps in the same shade. 
As well as doing this, I had a look at Manu text. This is a technique which uses a screen and protein dyes. I want to use this to create colourful backgrounds with, but using the dyes, you can write text as well. After applying the protein dyes to the screen, it needs to be dried, and is not visible. Then the Manu text which appears to look like honey, is rolled through the screen using a squeegee, and the colours/pattern become visible again. If I were to use this on a length of fabric, I would need to use a very large screen, and the problem with this technique is that you can only print with the colours that have been put onto the screen 3 times before they start to fade and run out. I would have to keep on creating a pattern on the screen to fill the length of fabric, but depending on how big the screen is, I might not have to as it may be large enough to print the whole piece. 

Also, after doing a few, I have found that the first few prints are very bright, and the ones towards the end where the colour is fading are a lot nicer, and won't clash with the print. I think the colours used in this piece are very sixties, and that is not the look I was going for. I think I need to think about the colours I use very carefully, as they need to be sophisticated, and right now they aren't. Also, sometimes the colours dry differently to how they are when they're wet, so I need to experiment and see how the colours dry, depending on which ones I want to use. I need to stick to a certain colour palette, and decide what this is going to be.

This is the test print I did on the manutext background, but this was done on the lighter side of the manu text. One problem that I had was all my designs/images were on one screen, and it was a very large screen, so if I wanted to use just one image, I had to mask off the rest of the screen, which also made it harder to see where I print the design. I got fed up after a while, as the screen was very heavy as well, and was taking up a lot of time to do just the one print, and I had wanted to get through a lot during the afternoon. The one main thing I need to change about this test is the size of the screen and the layout of my designs on the screen. The floral ones all should be on one screen, and the architectural ones should be on a separate screen so layering the different patterns up is easy. 

I did a few prints on some other manu text backgrounds as well. I did try and use more calm colours and think about the combinations, but the problem is you don't know what they'll look like when you print with them, so it's a bit risky to use in my final piece, as I wouldn't want to take the risk of not knowing what it would look like - what if it turned out to look like something that I hadn't had in mind and I didn't like it? I don't want to do it that way. I want to plan it out so I have at least a vague idea as to what and how my final piece will look like. 

This is another sample I created. This piece is mainly the architectural design which I am not too keen on. I have drawn on some of the flowers from the floral design to sew/embroider, but as the fabric that I used was muslin, and its quite thin, when I tried to sew into it, it was really hard - I even had the fabric on an embroidery hoop, but it was too thin and kept coming out. For one of my ideas, I wanted to used this material and sew into it, but I don't think I will as it is too hard to sew into. If I do, I won't be able to sew into it. Also, as I used manu text for the background, the colours clash with the design, and attention is diverted from the design which I am trying to make my focus point. I don't think I will be using manu text as a technique to create a background. 

This piece is cotton that has been dyed using protein dyes. I am not really fond of this either. I tried to put the two designs together - the floral and architectural, but the screen had started to fall apart, and when I printed one of the flowers, I lifted the screen and there was a big grey smudge. I gave up after this. The screen had to be re done.

This was the same. The colours of the manu text background are too dominant for the design to come through. Even if they are toned down, I don't think it will work. 

This piece was also on cotton, but the manu text has stiffened the fabric more than I thought it would have. I have also drawn on some floral patterns and outlined them on the sewing machine. I used purple thread, and it hasn't really stood out as much as I thought it would have. However, I do think it adds to the design to have the floral and architectural together.