Showing posts with label le potato. Show all posts
Showing posts with label le potato. Show all posts

Monday, March 14, 2011

fifteenth bird

Ok, this might be my favorite project so far.


Make a unique print by cutting up a potato or sponge, and use it to stamp on a material of your choice.










I chose le potato.


This one had grown poisonous rootlings, so I didn't feel too guilty about using it for something other than food.






The other nice thing about le potato is that if you mess up with one end, you have a back-up.


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I decided to make a star. Mostly because it's not tremendously difficult to do.














Here is the t-shirt, awaiting its fate.










No, that's not doom you smell. It's bleach. I thought it could be interesting to use bleach rather than paint.


Meadow-y fresh!










Firstly, you dip le potato stamp into the bleach. Not for too long. The stamp doesn't absorb too much liquid before you get to the shirt.












Secondly, stamp, re-bleach, repeat.


I like that black shirts bleach to orange. <3










This is pre-wash. I threw it into the washing machine with detergent and washed it on cold cycle.












And this is how it turned out. I really like it.
















Tips: 
1. Put a garbage sack inside your shirt or the bleach will run through and you'll have a mirror pattern on the back.
2. Wash immediately in cold water.
3. Do this somewhere with plenty of air ventilation.
4. In the past, Carroll and I tried to bleach something with gel bleach (the kind that "doesn't splash"). While this is very considerate for laundry, it doesn't actually seem to bleach much color out of fabric. I don't know exactly what it's doing for your whites, but it definitely doesn't work for art projects.
5. I think that le potato works better for this than a sponge would because le potato is much less absorbent. Less absorbency=less bleach on your hands.