Whilst we waited for David to return home with shaving foam yesterday I thought I'd reacquaint myself and introduce Jessica to encaustic art. This is a craft I haven't picked up for decades but the friend I used to enjoy doing it with, who now lives in New Zealand, gifted me her childhood supplies the last time I saw her and I'm delighted to be putting them to use now.
The general idea is that you create pieces of art from beeswax mixed with pigment. The wax blocks are melted using a low heat and applied to special paper. We learned to use the iron first, applying the wax directly to the iron and then wiping it across the paper. Then we discovered the joy of making patterns in the wax by applying the iron and lifting it from the paper as if hinged to the table.
Once these basics had been understood we turned out attention to the stylus with it's two knibs and one metal brush attachment. You put the knib into the wax, which melts and is drawn up into the cavity of the knib where it is stored as liquid colour and released onto the paper as you write or draw as you would with a normal pen. It's brilliant!
I was so impressed with the way Jessica handled the tools. She thoroughly enjoyed her afternoon working with melted wax and even managed to create tiny wax penguins on her homework piece, again in the bottom right hand corner...
I also wanted to share the paper she had for getting used to the wax and tools and practising the techniques. I think it's rather beautiful...
We had such a lovely afternoon that I've put some new encaustic waxes and papers on my Christmas list ;-)
No comments:
Post a Comment