Canvassing for Linen

Since hemp is not legal to grow in the states and Canada, (although you wouldn’t be able to tell up here), and I don’t want to blatantly break the law on this project (why risk deportation from the Great White North?), I decided to grow flax to convert into linen. I could also use the seeds for linseed oil, but 1), seed and fibers are harvested at different times and 2) I’m hooked on using walnut oil ever since I started using M. Graham paints several years ago. It smells better and my brushes clean up nicely with only walnut oil & soap, saving me the effort of creating turpentine from scratch.

When I was in Colton, I visited K’s Nursery, bought three flax plants for a total of $6, and a bag of potting soil for $2.00. Very helpful and friendly people. Unlike other Nurseries in the region, they sell a lot more than just Christmas tree saplings.
They don’t have a website but follow the link for their contact info.
http://www.specialtynursery.org/members/

Here’s two shots of the plants in April:





I planted them at my parent’s property. Here’s a shot of their condition as of today (thanks sis!). They were moved a bit to make way for a walkway to my parent's new house (thus the different background). My plan for these three plants is to let one be harvested for fiber (for a proof of concept test), and the other two for seed. If I’m lucky, I’ll have enough flax from the seed to make a canvas.


Coming up: My visit to the Squaxin Island Native American Museum, and Fibrefest International 2007

We Have Paint! (One color anyway)

When I got back to Vancouver, I did a number of things to my parent’s soil to turn it into paint-ready pigment. (This is just proof of concept, so ignore the modern tools like plastic bowls, sledgehammers, knives, etc)

Sift: This was to remove really large particles.



Slurry: Make mud and let it settle to let the coarse heavy particles settle at the bottom, and finest particles separate to the top.



Drain: Duct tape, it works for everything!



Dry: My own dried out mud puddle. Cool cracks, huh? Looks like almost all the breaks are three lines from a single point.




Separate: Found it was easiest to use a carving knife. The coarse particles came right off, and the silt was harder, and actually carved pretty well. Too bad it’s so fragile, or I could sculpt with it.



Crush: I didn’t use a mortar and pestle this time, but will on my next test batch.



Mix with oil: Used M. Graham Walnut oil, and mixed it with a palate knife for about a half hour or so.

Final paint: Not too bad considering I made it from my parent’s front yard dirt! It’s still a little coarse, as it has the consistency of chocolate icing. I’m going to do a slurry on the fine pigment to see if I can get better results. Still, better than ketchup.



Other ideas with this soil;

I ran magnet I found on a shopping cart (cow magnet being marketed as a kid’s toy) through the pre sifted stuff, and it picked up iron particles! I’m going to try to isolate these, and rust them (maybe keep in water for a while?) to get an iron oxide powder for a really deep red.

Firing the silt may create darker colors. I’ll have to try this sometime too.

Next post: Details on how the canvas is coming.

M. Graham Factory Tour

It’s been a few weeks since we’ve taken the trip to my parent’s new place in Colton, OR, but I’ve finally been able to catch up with enough things to get back to documenting this project. The most exciting part was when Alyssa and I met Art Graham, owner of M. Graham paints. In addition to some invaluable tips that he had for my project, he also showed me how they made paint, and as luck would have it, they were making my favorite oil color when we visited; Ultramarine Blue.

If you would like to learn more about the best paints I’ve ever used, I’ve devoted an entire page to the visit.

Here are some things I’ll try based off of his advice:

Earth Tone Pigments
Many earth tone pigments are literally that: they come from dirt. Now, the pigments that any professional paint maker would use are going to be a lot more refined and have a much, much higher level of quality control and consistency than I’ll be able to come up with, but it is reassuring to know that I can actually use that beautiful red-clay color from my parent’s property in my work. The suggested way to do this is to filter the earth and remove any inconsistent particles, then crush it repeatedly. Afterwards, mix it with water and let it settle. The finest particles will settle at the top. Skim these off, and repeat the process. When done, I should have a substance about as fine as talcum powder, which can be mixed with the medium.

Black & White Pigments: Am I Willing to Kill an Animal for this Project?
Art mentioned that I might want to try pulverized chicken bones for white pigment. Apparently, the earliest tempura paints were made from egg yolk and ground chicken bones. Also, if I can burn the bones properly, I may also be able to get a really good black from them, too. This brings up a question that I’ve been wrestling with for a while on this project: am I willing to kill an animal for art? I think it will be a lot more justifiable if the rest of the animal is used too, but except for slugs, spiders, flies, mice and a few very unfortunate barnacles, I can’t say that I’ve ever killed anything. It’s funny how something that our race used to do to survive now brings with it such a moral dilemma. I’m going to experiment first on bones from leftovers. That at least delays my decision on black & white tones for a few more weeks.

Walnut Oil Medium
For walnut oil, I could do what Leonardo Da Vinci did: boil the walnuts and skim off the oil.

Green Pigment
Oxidized copper. I’ll see if I can find any copper ore on or near my parent’s place. If it’s off the property, I’ll have to see if someone is willing to trade it for labor, or perhaps something I’m already growing.

Pay Dirt!

For Easter, we visited my family, who had just moved into their new property (40 acres near Oregon City). Most of the property’s soil is a deep red clay. This soil is what reignited the idea of this art project in my mind. I thought that it might make a nice pigment.

As luck would have it, when we visited, my sister’s foundation on her new house was being installed (my sister, her husband and kids live on the same property), and there was a huge mound of dirt from which I took samples.
While I was there, I was able to do a couple of tests on the soil. As I didn’t have time to finish them, I smuggled some back to Canada with me.


But, I was able to create a slurry (i.e. mud) and let the contents settle. There turned out to be a fair amount of silt on this particular sample. The idea is to use the silt as a pigment.
More on this soil and my results up in Canada on the next post!

Scope of Project: What the Heck Was I Thinking?

After talking with a lot of people and looking deeper into each process, I’m beginning to narrow the scope of this project. Here’s what I’ve got so far (subject to change, but trying to keep it as pure as possible):

Documentation:

Documentation is considered outside of the core art project. I simply don’t have time to make a computer, digital camera or camcorder from scratch!! I’ll barley have time to make the painting and all the tools that lead up to the painting.

Information Gathering:

I can use any means to gather information. There’s experimentation, talking with subject matter experts, books and the internet. I know I’ll enjoy experimentation and talking with experts most, and I’m going to try to lean towards those whenever I can. I’m not trying to go through every stage of human technological development on my own with no help. That would take well over the rest of my life!

Proof of Concept:

To make best use of my time, tests can use modern equipment. If the test result works with modern equipment, I will then do the same technique from scratch to arrive at similar results. Examples: using a mortar and pestle to crush soil into a fine powder (perhaps later done with a hip joint from a deer or maybe two stones) glass jars and bowls to mix materials. It looks like I might have to get into pottery before this project is over. Finding fire able clay will be a challenge…

Location of Raw Goods

I’m going to try to make everything from my local environment, primarily from the property where I live, and my parent’s property in Oregon. For items unavailable in either location, the Pacific Northwest (Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia) will be my maximum area to find the items.

Bartering

For items that I cannot create from scratch within five years, it’s OK for me to barter goods or services with others in my community. A good example would be walnuts. It would take me longer than five years to grow a walnut tree and be able to harvest its walnuts.

However, I could barter what is growing on my property now for walnuts. I’ll have plenty of apples and plums come mid summer.

Metal

Smelting is a major technological advance that we’ve made as a race. Primitive smelting is also very hazardous, as the process releases arsenic and other poisons into the air. I’m not going to pollute my parent’s property, or poison my family for this art project, so I won’t do any smelting. So, I’ll try to barter for scrap metal that I’ll rework into tools, loom parts, nails, wire, etc…

Community Involvement
Right now, I’m growing flax on my parent’s property. It’s not like I drive down there every few days to water it. Some processes are going to take many hands to build (like if I decide to make my own kiln, or create my own blacksmithing shop) So, some parts of the project are going to be community based, but I’m still going to try to do as much as possible on my own. As my wife keeps saying “You’re really trying to find the hardest way to do this aren’t you?” My reply: “Well, yes, otherwise what would be the point?”

Quick Update

I've been back from the visit to my parent's new property for a while, and have a whole lot to talk about! So much, in fact, that it's a lot more than one entry. So, for at least the next couple of months, expect a new blog posting weekly by Sunday night. In the meantime, I'll tide you over with links to places that I've visited that directly relate to this project.

K's Nursery
M Graham Paints
Squaxin Island Tribe Museum, Library and Research Center
Fibrefest International 2007 Convention
Wild Rose Fibres

More on each of these places later!

What's For Dinner?

Check out this transfer! I think it looks like a gopher with a peanut in his mouth. Alyssa thinks it looks like a deep sea fish with glowing lure thingy in front of his head. It was made by putting typing paper onto Alyssa’s finished plate of beets and balsamic vinaigrette. Not exactly 100% part of the art project, but thought it was worth a post.

.