Video Recording: Illustrative Play Time: Painting with Tea Paints, Egg Tempera and Natural Dyes

In this class Cara shows how to create illustrative paintings by extracting color from petals, leftover dye baths, and playing with pH modifiers to make paint on different types of art papers. Cara will experiment with art grade water color papers, khadi cotton recycled papers, and handmade washi paper. She covers adding mordants to the paint along with metal salts to create sturdy and lasting creations.

Cara will also lead a demonstration on melting petals and frozen flowers on paper and how to make marks with different hand made paintbrushes. She also gives a recipe for egg tempera, tea paint and medieval oak gall ink.

We suggest watching the class first, and then gather materials and participate at your own speed. This class is great for making stationery, gifts and memorable wrapping paper along with giving you tools to enhance your own creative practices. You will also be able to download a pdf with written instructions.

Materials you will need – or purchase the workshop and the Play Time Painting kit bundle option.

• Ground Oak gall
• Iron
• Aluminum sulfate
• Soda Ash
• Citric Acid
• Red Cochineal extract
• Marigold Mix extract
• Liquid Logwood
• A few dried flowers like marigold or coreopsis or your choice.
• pH strips

These above ingredients are available in a Play Time Painting kit bundle and includes 100grams each of the mordants, minerals and assists and 25g each of Red cochineal and Marigold Mix, a 4 ounce bottle of liquid logwood and a handful of dried flowers.

You will also need

• Liquid Sumi Ink (Purchase from art supply store such as Dick Blick)
• Watercolor paper – a few sheets approximately 9×12″
• Other papers, such as cotton rag, washi or other styles of watercolor paper (Optional)
• Your favorite paint brushes
• a few small dishes or ceramic palette, a water cup, a few small jars with lids for storing paints
• one raw hen’s egg
• Paper towels or clean rags
• Coffee filters
• A low, flat container like a storage tub large enough to soak a rectangular piece of watercolor paper.

Workshop details:

Purchase access to the online workshop only or buy the workshop and dye kit bundle.  The dye kit includes all the dyes and flowers, mordants and minerals in the top part of the Materials List. Supply your own favorite watercolor paper.  Cara provides suggestions for various papers and other optional tools for different surface effects.

Cara Marie Piazza is a natural dyer and artisan working in New York City. She creates one of a kind textiles using only natural dye stuffs such as botanicals, plant matter, minerals, non-toxic metals and food waste. She treats her fabrics through alchemical dye sessions, ancient shibori techniques and bundle dyeing, transforming each textile into its very own story. She works with both designers and artists to realize their natural dyeing needs as well as creates custom pieces for private clients. Cara teaches workshops on natural dyeing and curates unique experiences merging healing, color and art.