WORKSHOP DESCRIPTIONS

Interested in a workshop or have questions: contact Kerr or call 973-875-2238

Past the Safety Net--Exploring the Possibilities

Working with a variety of approaches and materials, individual and group critiques, and your chosen image as a point of departure, push past your usual point of safety. Deconstructed screen printing, monoprint, basic screen printing, painting, drawing, collage, transfers, journals, collaborations--using fiber reactive dyes, textile paints, creative exercises and play, explore the possibilities of one image for the week.

Spontaneous Screen Printing/Basic Screen Printing

Color, texture and spontaneity is the focus: silk screens, fabric, textile paints and a sense of play are the tools. This workshop approaches screen printing as a design, painting and monoprint process. Through the use of textile paints and easily removable stencils such as wax, vellum, crayon rubbings, paper and found objects, participants will discover the amazing variety of marks and textures possible with a screen and simple stencils.
No drawing or printing experience is required. 

Discovery Through Process/Deconstructed Screen Printing

Deconstructed Screen printing is a technique I developed to allow me to use a screen in a more spontaneous and painterly manner.  This workshop explores that facet of screen printing on fabric - the unpredictable, the 'happy accident', the intuitive.

Employing the silk screen as a painting and mono printing tool, we will print over textured surfaces, allow the dye to dry in the screen, alter the screen further and print. The image softens and gradually disappears as more prints are made. Using natural fabrics, Deconstructed screen printing, fiber reactive dyes, discharge, resist, direct painting onto the screen and fabric - textiles full of depth and personal imagery will be created.
The resulting fabric may be used as an end in itself or a point of departure for further embellishment.
No screen printing experience required - we will not be using the screen in the 'typical' manner anyway.
Great workshop for quilters who loved textures, collage artists and surface designers looking for ways to increase their mark making vocabulary. 

Block Printing/Monoprinting on Fabric

The focus of this workshop is a creative approach to block printing and mono printing. Using linoleum cutting techniques, soft, easily cut printing blocks and water based textile paints, participants will create repeat designs and make their own block prints.

We will experiment with the special characteristics of the materials and tools. Sharp edges caused by the cutting tools combined with different methods of inking the block, printing on different fabrics (velvets, linens, loosely woven textiles), combining with mono printing and found objects, overprinting, using stencils on the block when inking, being neat or messy - the possibilities using this age old technique are endless.
While textile paints are used in this workshop - all techniques are applicable for use with thickened dyes or block printing inks.

Transfer Printing on Fabric: An Introduction to Disperse Dyes

Have you been reading about the disperse dyes/dye transfer method, wanting to give it a try-This workshop is a comprehensive and intense introduction to the dye sublimation process(transfer printing) Our focus is on experimentation with the media and learning about materials and equipment. We will experiment with dye crayons, powder dyes, and dye paints by direct painting, stamping, spraying, stenciling, layering; creating designs on paper first, and then transferring them to fabric via iron or heat press. Samples of fabrics will be included to aid in your experimentation. Disperse dyes work on polyester and blended fabrics---dyes are painted directly onto paper, dried, and transferred from paper to fabric using heat. They are perfect for anyone wanting to work with fabrics other than the"natural" fibers, small studios, children

Enhancing Visual Interpretation

This is not a 'how to draw' class, but a workshop for enhancing self-expression, awareness, design and interpretation. We work loosely and spontaneously with a variety of materials and approaches - including caran d'arche crayons, monoprint, resists, bleach, batik on paper, collage and not normal screen print. 

Translating designs created in these media into textile media (fabric, dyeing, quilting, painting, screen printing) will be discussed fully. No drawing experience is necessary - the goal of this workshop is to remind us to pay attention, trust intuition, PLAY and go home rejuvenated and with stacks of ideas for new work.