This art thing is pretty new to me. When I thought of the idea of dyeing my own paper to create one of a kind SunStars, I simply Googled "how to dye paper", and found a site that gave simple directions for using shaving foam, food coloring and paper towel to easily dye your own paper (http://curbly.com/diy-maven/posts/1272-how-to-tie-dye-paper). I was ready-I had all those things in the house already! I followed the steps and came up with some beautiful designs, which turned into a beautiful SunStar.
I was feeling very proud, and was doing some bragging to my boyfriend's mom, who used to run a large art supply store in town. She informed me that food coloring was not light fast. I had no idea what this meant...but I figured it wasn't good. Turns out this beautiful star will eventually turn itself back to white over time as exposed to light. Cool trick, but not really what I had in mind.
After discussing different kinds of paint with several people, doing lots of looking and researching, I have started using a new paint-liquid acrylic. As most artists know, including me now, acrylic is light fast, so it won't fade away if exposed to light. It is just as easily used in the same process as the food coloring, and the designs are just as beautiful, Plus, the color combination options are endless.
I started with testing the liquid acrylic with two themes-fire and water. The designs and stars couldn't have turned out better.
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| Water theme-paper after dye process |
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| Fire theme-paper after dye process |
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| "Calm Ocean" Sunstar, created from dyed paper above |
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| "Fiery Sun" Sunstar, created from dyed paper above |
Now, all was not lost with my first endeavor of using food coloring-turns out UV protection spray is also available.
Jamie
