Gelli Plates

I was sorting through the work I produced doing demos at the Crafts4Crafters Show in Exeter back in January.  Some of the best ones went into the Product Review section in the March issue of Workshop on the Web, but there were a few more that didn't make it.

This Gelli Plate print was made using a homemade stamp (more about that later) and acrylic paint onto black cotton sateen.  I pressed the stamp into the Gelli Plate before printing.

 This was done by using a Catalyst Wedge to make marks in the plate before printing.  The Wedge was W-04.  Art Van Go supply these wedges and they are great for mark-making on the Gelli plate because they are made of silicone and shouldn't damage your Gelli surface, as long as you aren't too heavy-handed.

This was done using a feather stamp pressed into the Gelli plate.  The fabric used had already been printed (the blue colour is Pebeo Studio acrylic, an interference colour which is fabulous with the Gelli).

I like this one because it's such a bright colour.  This was made using another Catalyst Wedge.  W-03.

This is made using the homemade stamp again and the Pronty A4 Leaves mask stencil.  The colours came together really well.  Again, the Pebeo studio blue was used.

Another Catalyst wedge print.  The feather mask is also in there.

Going back to the home-made stamps.  I went on an Angie Hughes Velvet course, and she showed us how to make our own stamps.  It really opened up our imaginations for creating interesting and bold designs.   Angie then did an article on this subject for Workshop on the Web  December 2013 issue, which is a brilliant article.  We took this article to the Crafts4Crafters show as well to demonstrate how the articles can teach you skills that you can then take further.   Here are the stamps I created:

I did make some leaf skeleton stamps and plain fatter stamps to frame those.  The feather I used to print onto the Gelli plate (further above) is also made in this way.

The Show was fabulous.  All the people there were very friendly.  We met some great exhibitors, including Farno Designs, who had some fantastic hand-dyed fabrics which I used Decolourant on with various stencils.