Re: flax paper and palladium
Anne,
How nice to see your work, and to know you use handmade paper and know so
much about it! I have filed your notes in my info file. You moved to
Detroit from Tennessee???
Yes, the student is doing paper sculpture with flax. I was surprised at how
the paper did not pucker or shrink after pt/pd printing on it, though! And
the reason she buys the paper pulp is that the equipment which I think is as
you say below--a Hollander-- is buried in one of the professors' basements
so she has to order it as a...liquid or something.
I'll check out twinrocker asap...the thought of paper making is delectable
but I cannot take on another project in my life...alas.
I'm going to do the cyanotype test right now...Camden, hopefully it'll be
done and I'll bring it to school today if you are there.
Chris
Here are 3 images, all photograms. Kinda different.
http://annesvl.myphotoalbum.com/albums.php
Anne
I am a papermaker so I'm happy to be able to contribute something to
the list. I will be teaching some of these combined processes
probably next year at the Brimingham Bloomfield Art Center just
outside Detroit. I was just hired to be on their faculty.
I'll mention sources for paper and info at the end of this email.
Paper made from flax and abaca (a wonderful fiber from the banana
family) are much, much stronger than any cotton, whether it's rag or
cotton linters. In the sheet formation process they (flax and abaca)
have higher shrinkage so must be restrain dryed otherwise they
shrivel up. (That is great for some purposes, such as paper
sculpture.)
I've been using combinations of flax, cotton and abaca for some time
with my alternative processes and am very happy with these fibers.
The weight varies depending on the papermakers desires. But both
flax and abaca have wonderful wet strength for very thin sheets. The
paper will withstand repeated rinsing, I've never had any of my own
paper fall apart on me. (Until recently when I tried thinner sheets
of !00% Rag, I didn't like it and won't do that again).
An occasional project I'll do is make larger sheets (22X30 or larger)
of flax paper, walnut dyed (soaked walnut hulls, you get a great
dye). Using cyanotype I get a navy blue that is attractive on the
walnut colored paper. Frequently I'll get oversized negatives made
from Kinkos or a blueprint company and make images. On the walnut
dyed paper, the navy blue color and with the "unsharp" oversized
negative I get interesting textural pieces.
Also, I have toned cyanotype paper with the tannic acid rinse, then
washing soda. Depending on the length of time I can get an almost
black color to the cyanotype portion. The paper itself can be a bit
stained but what I have done is to draw with watercolor pencils or
watercolors on the images (usually floral photograms) and get a very
unique image.
I have a type of Hollander beater so can make the pulp myself. It is
expensive otherwise. Making the paper cuts the expense way down but
it is work and time consuming.
Camden mentioned U of Iowa as a good source for the paper. They are,
in fact they restored the US Bill of Rights (I believe). Great
facilities.
Also here are two other sources for those interested:
Twinrocker
www.twinrocker.com (excellent source for information about paper and
a place to purchase paper)
And here is a book written in about 1984 called:
THE NEW PHOTOGRAPHY
by Catharine Reeve & Marilyn Sward
Excellent papermakers who experimented quite a bit with alt processes.
Chris, fun to hear of your experiments.
Anne