A good impression

More fun with paper, from our last Book & Paper Arts meeting.

There's a technique called eco-printing, where prepared paper or cloth is layered with leaves, blossoms, and other plant material, rolled up into a tube, and steamed. Natural dyes are transferred from the plant to the paper, and set by the steam and mordant. It's fascinating, but a little fussy, especially in the rolling-up stage. But our newest member, Rachel, learned a short-cut.

By taking advantage of an electric heat press, you can eco-print small pieces, up to 12" square, in about four minutes. You soak your paper or cloth in a mordant (dye-fixing chemical, in this case, aluminum acetate), then layer into a stack: a sheet of teflon, a sheet of damp felt, paper, plant stuff, another sheet of paper, a felt, and top with two sheets of teflon (which she buys online). Four minutes in the heat press, and you have matching unexpectedly colorful pages.


I used rose blossoms, for the purple/red, Japanese maple, also purplish, strips of yellow onion skin, for brilliant ochre, and leaves of the mimosa tree, which printed out a brilliant lemon yellow.

It was great fun, almost enough to get me pricing my own press. Almost.

Creaky

It's gone back to grey and chilly in the morning, after a week of almost-summer. I'm feeling a little creaky at Market set-up, so I decide to feature my creekiest plates: river otter and raccoon and duck (not shown).

We've been having parking issues with Farmer's Market customers, of late. Last week, three of them pulled in to the middle of our load-in, reverse angle-parked like the vendors, then walked away to get their produce. I managed to catch the third one to explain that, no, they really shouldn't be doing that, then tipped off Market security to have a word with the others as they came back with their strawberries. This week, I had to explain to an entitled SUV with California plates that, no, he couldn't park here, it's a loading zone for Saturday Market until 10 am, then had to follow him down the block and say no, not here either. Why do you open at 9 o'clock if there's no parking? he snarled. We don't, I replied, that's the Farmer's Market. We're not them.

That's part of the problem. What looks like one big event is actually three. There's the Saturday Market, the corners of two blocks south of 8th Street on either side of Oak; Farmer's Market, the northwest corner of that intersection, and Free Speech Plaza, on the northeast. Three different entities.

Farmer's Market opens at 9 am sharp--in the past, they used to penalize vendors for selling early, though I don't know if they still do--and closes at 3 pm. Saturday Market, which features handmade art and craft, made by the seller (and also hot ready-to-eat food), runs from 10 to 4. We stagger the hours to make set-up and take-down less chaotic. Free Speech Plaza, gods only know what their rules are. You can sell anything, homemade, imported from China, you name it; you only need a $5 monthly permit from the city.

It doesn't help that they're tearing up the streets in both directions. Also, the helpful rectangular "Loading Zone Only during [time]" signs on the parking meter stems have been replaced by smaller, triangular signs on the body of the meters themselves, graphically very nice, but hard to read or even notice from a moving car.

What frustrates me is that there's plenty of parking two blocks south in the OverPark, or one block west in the Parcade. It's even free on Saturday, which street parking is not.

That said, once 10 o'clock rolled around, it was a pretty good day. Parents in for graduation, kids looking for Father's Day presents, folks in athletic wear for a Nike track meet I had no clue about. I had a nice talk with another second-generation Minnesota potter (we both studied under students of Warren Mackenzie), met a real Minnesotan, from Duluth (and found myself falling back into my midwestern accent), and met the parents of college student regular patron of mine (he looks so much like his mom!). Saw two ferrets in a bubble backpack, taking turns looking out the window. And met this guy.

Never met him before, but we have fabric in common. About twenty years ago, I used this exact print to make a blouse for Denise. His was sewed by his sister, who is much better at matching patterns than I ever hope to be. Denise no longer fits her blouse and has thrifted it along, but still has this pair of drawstring shorts. And I've incorporated scraps into my pandemic quilt project, still incomplete.

Art gecko.

A perilous journey

Caught between our Market and the Farmer's, last Saturday.

Next weekend!

Arrgh! Finally got my booth assignment from the UVA Summer Arts Festival next weekend. We're in the same space as usual, although they've renumbered the map, so instead of 25, I'm now 52.

But they've also changed the hours? Art booths close at 7 pm instead of 8, Friday and Saturday, which is a good thing, but they've moved up opening on Friday. Instead of opening at noon, as they have in the past, they're now opening at 10 am. This will definitely up the stress levels considerably during load-in.