well g'day viewers, my name is graeme stevensonand i'd like to invite you to come on a journey of creativity and learning and adventurethrough the series colour in your life. there's an artist in every family throughout the world and lots oftimes there's an artist deep down inside all of us as well. so grab your kids, your brothers, your sisters,your aunties, uncles and mums and dads and come and see how some of thebest artists in australia do what they do. (music plays) we’re in the beautiful city of sydney this show to seean amazing artist, so come along and enjoy the incredible talentthat sydney has to offer. g’day graeme.
g’day rae. how are you darling? how are you? good to see you. good to see you too. can i comein and see what you’re up to? come on in and have a cup of tea. thank you darling. that’s great. well g’day viewers and welcome back to colourin your life. we have an amazing day today. as you know we’re actually seeking many artisticpeople as we go through our journey across australia to bring you these series’. and i’m with a lady at themoment called rae woolnough. how are you rae? i’m good thanks, graeme.
thank you so much for having us in your studio.this is going to be great. but rae works with… funnily enough, works with wool and fibres and silks and alpaca;some amazing stuff, to actually make artwork. i think what you do is absolutely fascinating. thank you and this is going to be an amazing, amazing show. but,what are your influences? i remember as a kid, well it wasn’t that too long ago, there was a two-dollarnote, and it was a gentleman called john macarthur… hmm. and his wife, elizabeth… and they werean influence on you weren’t they? they were, yes. many, many years ago my parentsused to take tours on what was elizabeth farm,
before it was taken overby the national trust. uh huh. as part of the learning about the farm they were actually presentedwith photocopies of john and elizabeth macarthur’s letters, and the challenge was to sit there and read these letters.and, they started to talk about the sheep and the breeding, and as you know john and elizabeth macarthur were veryinstrumental in the merino breeding in australia. so i guess i probably got a bit of a romantic attachment, being adreamy thirteen-year-old reading about the wool industry and dreaming about ships and sheep and what not. but really… itcame back to me about ten or twelve years ago when my daughter actuallyre introduced me to felt. yeah
she came home one day from uni and said i haveto do felting, and i was like, oh, i remember that… and she started to show me theprocess and i just fell in love with it. and it’s just fascinating the way you do it. but whatyou’re going to do with us today, and it really is, when you look at rae’s work, it is an art form.i mean you frame, you mat these things at the end of it. but they literally are like three-dimensional paintings it’s the onlyway i can describe it, but… created with fibres and wool. and the wool itself, to feel some of the fibres andthis wool, is just… it’s like a feather isn’t it? it is, it’s like working with clouds. it’s just amazing. yeah.
but, you’re going to take me throughthe whole process today of the dyeing… yep. …for a start, and this is really going to be very interesting. and youuse a microwave, so can you tell us how you go about all this? i do, yes. now the reason i use a microwave with my dye isi actually think it’s a little more environmentally friendly, and you don’t end up with a great deal of residual dye,which you then have to get rid of either by pouring it down the sink or putting it in your garden. these are actuallyprotein dyes, and protein dyes actually work with protein fibres. so they are things like silk and wool. and it works really well on yourhands as well. so i like to put on gloves when i’m using it. but it won’t work on synthetics and it doesn’tlike cotton, so it’s an interesting sort of dye. what isn’t particularly environmentallyfriendly is that i actually use glad wrap…
okay …to wrap up the dye and put it in the microwave. and thereason i also use this process is to, unlike a dye bar, where you put the whole piece offabric in a large amount of dye… hmm you only get the one colour. i actually want to createinteresting um, degrees of colour in my dyeing. and i like to have almost a random look to my dyes, so that’s another reason i use the microwavebecause the dye tends to not bleed into itself let’s see how this goes about. so let’s have a look. so i’ve put out theglad wrap, which is basically just to contain it.
one more should do it. put that on. that’s good. okay, the firstthing i do is actually wet the silk that’s just water? just water. ah, the reason i wet the silk is it helpsthe dye disperse more easily when i need it to. and… you don’t want any dry patches in your silk atall or when you’re putting it in the microwave. oh, okay. silk can burn when you heat it too much. oh right, okay
now i’m thinking with this particular artwork, i actually had abeautiful necklace that i purchased a little while ago. and i love the colours. so i thought i’d do adesign based on these beautiful colours. hmm, it’s beautiful isn’t it? nd try and get that same look of the texturesand the beautiful colours that are in that.a so the dyes that i’ve got here are greens… mostly greens and blues greens and blues and a few browns. and… is it toxic enough to were gloves? not really. this is just so when i touch the dyesi don’t end up with purple hands for the day.
because it does soak into your skin pretty quickly.so i think i might get a little bit of green in here… and really i’m just going to pourthe dyes on here. just in little spots. okay. and that’s the only…it’s just water you put in with it? just water. okay. look at that. and i’m just going to massage that in a little bit, to create thecolours that i want. i want to get a little bit of a random look now i think a nice blue would be good. that’s a better colour. i like that alright, so you’re going to use some…what is it crystal? or a natural form of it? yes, it’s an actual powder. this is the actual dye,before we actually turned it into liquid water.
all i’m going to do is justsprinkle a little bit of that… yep …in powder form, on here, and the moisture that’s actuallyin here already, will create some interesting speckles. it’s amazing that what you’rereally doing is, this is your canvas. it is. yes. this is my starting block i suppose,so now all i’m going to do is wrap this up. so when i nuke it in the microwave, ah, it doesn’tsplatter all over the inside of the microwave. sure i’ll put that in a microwave proof containerand into the microwave. here we go. it’s done.
it’s done. doesn’t look terribly appetising does it? i’m going to need a sauce on mine, i cantell you now. okay. so what happens now? i’ll let that cool now very, very slowly.as i said it’s… it’s the heat allowing it, when it goes through the cooling process,it’s what makes the dye more permanent and when we open that up later therewill be virtually no residual dye left behind wow, that’s amazing isn’t it? so alright,we go from that, obviously we let one cool, but there’s probably a spot whereyou’ve got another one set up is there yes, definitely. alright rae, well this is the finished product. you’ve actually dyedit and then you’ve rinsed it. and now we’ve actually dried it.
you can see how it’s come out so beautifully and these littleflecks that are in there. i mean that’s the gold fleck. but now, you’ve actually started to lay out this magnificentwool underneath, so explain to me what we do next. okay, this is the actual felt… base. it’s made out ofroving… what they call roving, which is the wool. so this is my pallet. basically the artist has a palletof colours. i have all these different colour wools. and i’ll quite often blend those. what i’ve done here is i’ve started to lay out the fleece.you can see i’ve actually got it on a nylon material. that’s quite important as part of the process because being completelysynthetic, these fibres when we start the felting process, wont migrate through that particular fabric and i canactually release this. but it will migrate through silk, and… so what i lay on the base, will actually comethrough the silk, so i need to decide where
i’m going to place my colours as i go through,matching up with silk on the other side. okay. particularly with the shibori technique that i’m going todemonstrate, the colours on the bottom actually end up on the top in some areas. so we’re lookingat almost a sandwich of two layers of felt, with silk in between and creatinginteresting textures and tones but you call it shibori? shibori. shibori is actually a japanese word. was going to say japanese, we use to call it tie-dyeing. okay, this is actually tie felting. okay
okay, so i’ll just show you the rest.we’ll put the silk aside for now. and i’ll continue to lay out these fibres. and it’s just a matter ofpulling it out and letting it drip down to where i want to place it. and we’re so lucky in australia. we’ve got access to the best qualitymerino fleeces and… we tend to take it for granted. we just don’t realise how lucky we are,that australia did basically you know… develop on the back of the sheep they use to say,and it’s really lovely to be able to work with product that’s australian. and i know that viewers can’t see thatthere, but it’s really is so amazingly soft. it’s just beautiful. and the fibre itself,it’s so fine. it’s amazing. it’s beautiful. okay, so that’s my bed of fibre.
and now i’m going to put thesilk over the top of that. now this one i’m using a whole piece of silk.sometimes i don’t use a whole piece of silk. sometimes i’ll lay out the base fleece and then i’ll just put parts ofsilk over it, particularly when i’m doing some of my landscapes, i tend to just use parts of silk and other fibres.i’ll use hemp and the camel, corriedale, mohair, and make some really interesting textures on that,and i’ll do that a little bit later in this process as well. cool but i’m going to wet this down now. okay. this is the giant this is the giant wetted down…machine thing…
and it’s pressurised? it’s pressurised. so what i’m goingto put in here is warm water… …and i’m also going to put in a bit of soap.it’s pretty horrific looking stuff. oh god, have a look. and then i’m going to just spray it, wet it downand then i can start um, the felting process. so i’ll get going with that. and nowi’ll just wet the fibres down. yeah? make it a little bit gentler than that. it’s all those little tricks that you learn as you go along.people say, so how long did you do this? and the bottom line is,
it’s over a decade now isn’t it? it is. and i’ve been and learnt from lots of other people. i’ve beenreally fortunate to… have done workshops with people, international felters from lithuania and overseas,and it’s a constant learning process. every time you go to a workshop,you think you know everything. and you know you don’t. and then you find a newand another technique and another way to do felting, or another process that makesthe whole job a little bit easier. sure. and that’s a good point you just made.remember guys, workshops. you’ll learn a lot. professional development… yes
we call it. now i’m going to cover it withanother piece of the same type of material… …and i’m going to roll it up andactually start the felting process. this is a bamboo mat. some people like to use bubble wrap.you can use virtually anything that’s got a texture. so all were going to do… thank you… is to role this up. now i’mgoing to roll this way, and that will make it felt in that direction. and after about one hundred or two hundred rolls,i’ll turn it around and i’ll felt it in the opposite direction. so it will shrink in both directions. so i’m just going to roll this up. and i’mgoing to put a towel down underneath, just to collect the moisture soit doesn’t run all over the floor. there’s a plethora of materials andwool everywhere in your studio.
want me to do that for you? now, to make that stay, i’m just going to put a couple of rubberbands around it or tie it up, just to make it a little bit easier. just an old stocking or some old… an old stocking or… a rubber band’s good too. now what’sgood about the rush mat too, is that… this will get cold. and if i wanted to then warm it up, i can run over to the kitchensink or whatever and pour a bit more of the warm water on it. alright, i’ve had enough, it’s your turn do you want me to have a go? yes, you have a go. just nice longrolls like that. and you are felting. this is a first
this is a first for you graeme. this is unbelievable. now themongolians do this don’t they? that’s correct. now the mongolians were probably oneof the original makers of felt. they use it for their yurts. …they actually cut the fleece manually off their sheep they then beat it, with big wooden sticks, and that actuallyclears it of dirt and to a point chops the wool up. and they’ll quite often put it on what they call a motherpiece of felt. which is a piece which already exists, and they’ll roll it up like this, with wet skins and don’t use anysoap just water and then they drag it behind their horses. is that right? yep, yep. from one place to the nextthey drag it behind their horses.
i think that’s cutting out. is it alright? okay. and… that makes the felt. that’s just amazing. it’s absolutely fascinating.alright, two ninety nine, three hundred. well done. okay. then i’ll just turn it aroundand we’ll go in the other direction and the way you test your felt, to make surethat it is felted, is when we unroll it we can test it and if the fibres are still lifting off and it’s still slippery,then it’s not felted enough. and you have to keep felting. you can see it’s beginning to stick there; you’re doing a good job.so it’s still a little bit slippery so i’ll keep on felting and i’ll turn it around in the other direction and felt it in the otherdirection for a while. i’ll make a felter out of you yet.
i’ll tell you what. i’ll end up at thosefelting meetings from now on. the felting convergence. okay i’ve actually got anotherpiece of felt where i’ve already completed this process. so we might move to that. and i’ll show you that next partof the shibori art of felting. well i was having a good time.alright, let’s go to the other one. okay. let’s have a look well as you can see, well, it just feels fabulous. all of these fibres,through the rubbing process, have matted together. this is what the mongolians do too?
that’s what the mongolians did. yeah.but we’ve added silk and added colour. and this is the other side. you can see what’s happenedit’s the fibres actually migrate through the silk and they’ve started to shrink and by doing that they’vepulled the silk in and created this lovely ruching effect. and it’s… really made a blanket. hmm, it has, yeah, a lovely silk blanket. yeah. in saying that, you’ve turned this into an art formand you’ve started to put… is it buttons underneath? it is; it’s buttons. this is the shibori technique. all i’m doing istying buttons in and i stand back and look at the design and the colour and sort of imagine where i like to placeall these little clusters. and i tie them through here and then i’ll start to put other embellishments.so i’ll be putting other pieces of silk on there.
i’ll be putting other little bits of what they call silk throwster,which is basically a waste product but it’s beautiful. um i’ll also be putting more fleece over the top andthen going through the whole felting process again, and shrinking it down and ah and creating a lovely texture and theni’ll show you the last process a little further down the track. so you actually take buttons out later? i do, yes, yes. and all i do is i simply just get a button and as i said, i’m lookingat the design and deciding where i’m going to put the next… little floret that i’m creating and then all i’m going to do is actually tie that in. so it’s an oldform of tie-dyeing that we use to do way back in the 1970’s. i think we use to do rainbow shirts and…
i do remember those classic pants …and i’m going to tie them in and… i use different sizesto create interesting clusters and different looks. alright rae, well you’ve sort of tied all ofyour buttons into place, which is amazing. i’ve got an inkling of what she’s going todo with these now, which is pretty cool. but you’re going to actually puta lot more fibre down on this? that’s right. the next stage of the process is to actuallynow start to put in some more interesting textures. i’ll probably add in some more silk. maybe just some plain coloured silk. i’ll probably put morefleeces over the top because this is all a very textured finish. i’ll probably like to have some smoother areas to create some quietspaces. then i’ll also put in what’s called some silk throwster,
which is basically a waste product, which is lovely sort of matsilk fibre, and then felt it again working back to that idea of something like an opal or a gemstone. i’m trying to create all thosedifferent depths of colours with the different dark fibres. how much generally would you saya piece like this would sell for? look, i tend to sell my work around about the seven, eighthundred dollar mark. but, more than anything it’s just really satisfying to get that feedback from people when you have anexhibition or you have them on display and they come up to you and they go, ‘it’s felt!’ you know? and you see their eyeslight up as if they’ve never seen anything like it before. this is quite fascinating. they look likelittle mushrooms or little lichen of some sort. exactly this is where the buttons come into play?
that’s right. so how, just… yes we finish and dried it out and just going to go backand… remember how i tied it up with a synthetic thread? i very carefully cut that syntheticthread away so i don’t cut the silk. and… then i cut out the actualbutton to create that little floret. i’ll just pull that out. and i trim thisoff to create this lovely little flower. and it just stays there like that? it does alright, an amazing finished work here and it really is artby any means. it’s just a magnificent piece of work.
i think it’s just an incredible process that we’ve been throughhere today. i’ve learnt just so much. i think it’s amazing. ah, just to finish this off as a piece of artwork,you would normally have this in a mat and a frame? that’s right. yes, i have it mounted by my framer. i alwaysput my art works in what’s called a box frame for two reasons, one, there’s still quite a lot of natural oil in wool and fleece, soyou need to have some air movements and breathing space. and also the very fact that it’s so textured, i don’t want itsquashed behind glass. i want to be able to see those textures, so by putting it in a box frame, you canactually see the textures are revealed. well let’s… put that in there and we’ll go from there. well viewers, as you can see, another amazing day.an incredible piece of artwork created. and i have learnt so much today myself. rae i wouldlike to thank you so much for having us in here.
you’re welcome. it was absolutely incredible to see this process cometogether. and rae is one of the few people in the country; she’s been overseas to learn how to do this…you also conduct workshops don’t you? that’s correct. yes. i’m fortunate that i’m able to runworkshops from the virginia wool farm at annangrove, so if you’re interested in having classesyou can certainty contact them or contact me through my web siteand we can organise that. amazing. amazing day. also, great importance as wellobviously with the workshops you can learn so much. the colour in your life team is putting ona number of workshops next year ourselves, so make sure you get in touch with us at colour inyour life dot com dot au (colourinyourlife.com.au).
as always we’d like to thank our sponsors, all the peoplethat support us. we have some amazing things coming up in the next twelve months; some announcements thatwe’re going to keep to ourselves for the time being, but some really, really exciting stuff. but rae, once again,i’d really like to thank you for having us come along. thank you. it’s been incredible. and before i go, remember, as ialways say, make sure you put some colour in your life. we’ll see you next time guys. bye.