Rodica's 470 Blog!

Shadow Boxes a Success!

For last Wednesday’s class we were to bring supplies to create shadow boxes with our mentees. I had only created one shadow box before, so I had some ideas on what we could do and picked up a few things from home and brought them to class. From the beginning Igor was not very interested in the shadow box making process. Neither I nor Amy could convince him to try to create his own. So I decided that he and I would do one together. We began by cutting out some fabric from some fabric swatches we had in class. We picked a box and began hot gluing the fabric to the box. Igor was very helpful with that. He seems to be okay with tasks he is given, but he doesn’t want to try to create something on his own. We also painted the insides of the box, which he helped do. Since the paint color didn’t look that great, we ended up using some uno cards and gluing them to the sides of the box. I had brought a colorful paper cup and a Hawaii doll, which we placed on top of the cup. I noticed by this stage Igor began to be more involved. He began making suggestions. We glued some leaves on and I had remembered I had some pins that I grabbed at the last minute. We used those to pin items on top of the box. By this point, Igor was very involved. He was helping pin things and get our box looking good, since we were running behind and Lis kept telling us to take our shadow boxes to this area of the classroom where they were being photographed. We were hurrying; Igor was doing a lot more talking and working hard to get it done. He was getting excited with each item we added that made the shadow box look better. Finally, we were done and we took it up to be photographed. It was looking better than we expected, thanks to Igor and his creativity and help! Once he envisioned the project, he not only helped task wise, but he used his own creativity to make the project better! Thanks Igor, and good work!

Theater, Art, and Performing with Frientors

Yesterday, at our Friendtorship class, we enjoyed a guest lecturer, Angela Bolanos Osorio, who is a senior in Art Practices at PSU, and has experience in muralist and theater for over 10 years. She has been involved at the Milagro Theatre. Olga Sanchez, who is the Artistic Director from the Milagro Theatre was also present.

For the first half an hour or so, Angela gave a lecture on the history of Mexican theater art. It was very interesting to hear about how slave actors were supposed to dance and then they were sacrificed to the idols at the end of several days of performing. Glad we no longer do that. After her session, Olga Sanchez, led the class in a dynamic interactive session on how an actor thinks about performing and how they are engaged psychologically, physically, and intellectually.

She divided us in groups and made us aware of the physical involvement in any activity on state. Then she proceeded to engage us in the psychological process that goes on with an actor by taking on certain actions of a person we try to impersonalize. It was a fun activity with a lot of participation from the CLC students. In fact, a couple of them were so engaged in the process, that they brought significant enjoyment to the rest of the group as they “performed” their role in front of the group. It was definitely engaging and fun for all who attended.

How does one go about getting licensing deals in the textile licensing industry?

Is there a protocol? What type of fabric design can be licensed?

It was interesting to learn that many of the traditional textile end markets do not license artwork, but rather they buy outright from design studios who actually focus on producing work for their markets.

So what should a new designer do if they want to license their work?

According to Carol Van Zandt (creativeconceptsdesignstudio.com), it is best to first pick one end market and research it. Find out what kind of art the companies use and in what format. Then try to format your designs for that market. Carol recommends being “patient as it can take a lot of time to land a licensing deal, and even longer before the product is actually produced and you start getting paid royalties.”

The best way to find manufacturers is by looking at products in store or researching wholesale trade shows or trade magazines that cover those products. She says: “Pick a product category and try to figure out who the top five, ten or more companies are, where they are located, what kind of art they use, then find out one by one, if they license their art, buy their art outright, or design in house.”

Designing for a commercial market is like owning your own business, and each product is in a market of its own. It seems that the best approach is to develop art for a particular market and end product, rather than find end products for the art created. This made sense to me though I never gave it much thought before now.

How to Copyright Fabric

Under the US Copyright Act of 1790, Congress is “to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing, for a limited time to authors and inventors, the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.” Apparently, the word “writings” has been widely interpreted by the courts to include fabric designs because they are viewed as original and categorized with paintings and other graphic materials. The copyright does not extend to the fabric itself, so if you are a designer who creates a dress out of bought fabric, you are not covered under this copyright protection. But, if you are a designer who actually creates his or her own fabric, that protection is afforded to the designs as long as they are “intricate and complicated” (caseclothesed.com).

According to the US Copyright Law, fabric must “rise to the level of artistic design” in order to be protected. An “ordinary viewer’s test” is used to determine the design’s originality. Once this is established, you may have a claim for infringement. There has to be a strong evidence of substantial copying, which may be hard to prove in fabric design because many fabric designs are routinely copied by other fabric designers in creating other patterns. But if you feel that your works are works of imagination, and are artistic and original, copyrighting the fabric designs includes three steps: application, payment ($35 for online registration), and deposit. The first two are obvious. The last one includes “depositing your work” with the Library of Congress. The registration becomes effective on the day that the Library of Congress receives the registration. They review the application and deposit to make sure they meet the requirements of Copyright law and regulations, and then, if approved, assign a number and a certificate of registration, which will be mailed about 4 months after submitting the package. 

“A good design should say something about the surface that it is applied to”

says Marcus James, an illustrator. The content and concept are important when it comes to pattern design; there should be something clever about it.

Modern pattern design is not confined by the rules of the past as people are learning to apply their creativity in unique aways away from the use of computer technology. Many designers are beginning to explore this territory, and they find that their processes are evolving as are their patterns.

Many designers love to hand-produce their paper and fabric prints when possible, and not eliminate the designer’s hand from the process. But designers are limited because of the time it takes to hand-produce. Mass-production still remains the fastest way to get large quantities done. But hand-printing has been rediscovered and designers love to silk screen. It seems as though there is a fight between choosing something which is visually pleasing and something which is a good idea.

People love the process of creating hand-printed work because the 90s were filled with the minimalist approach, overuse of the victorian styles, mass-produced products, and badly computer designed fabrics or reproduced archives. Back then designers were interested in finding out what the new toy—the computer— could do for them, so design in generally suffered. Now people want more individuality and quality, and designers achieve this by knowing and using their mediums well. People want to feel moor human, to want to feel things and touch them (Sam Borkson; Friends With You).

As trends in design come and go, Johanna Basford observes that “pattern and ornament in decoration is event throughout the centuries [because] one unique feature of pattern [design] is its ability to adapt.” While it seems that pattern design disappeared for a coupled of decades, it actually was simply neglected as design underwent the digital revolution.

Patterning, as a form of decoration, became popular as early as the 1700th century, when wallpapers began to show up in London. These wallpaper prints were usually single sheets, single color, and were impressed onto paper by wooden blocks. As the techniques improved and printing came about, wallpaper made it onto the roll by the 1800th century. By the Arts and Crafts revival of the 19th century, multi-colored designs were being produced. Many contributed to this development. The French at that time focused on composition and produced designs with “great finesse and accomplishment” (computerarts.com), while the English focused on techniques and surfaces. All the while, marvels of art and technology arriving from the East. By the 1950s, things were showing signs of improvement, but printing still was a drawn-out and expensive process. “One just could not do type design one week and textiles the next” (computerarts.com).

Of course, computers changed all that, but design became mediocre. But the tide turned and design in general is more expressive of the designers interest and expertise with his medium.

 

… every surface has a structure and every structure has a surface.

I read this quote on www.surfacedesign.org, though it was not attributed to anyone in particular. The quote was at the beginning of an article that described the history of surface design in the United States. In summary, surface design was the result and interest in craft techniques and materials that artists used for personal expression in the 1970s. There was a lot of creativity and interest by artists, which caused a lot of fiber programs to be started in colleges and universities around the country. Initially, emphasis was paid to weaving and fiber construction, so other forms of surface-oriented design was being left out. But to bring that into focus, Elsa Screenivasam from the University of Kansas and Patricia Campbell from the Kansas City Art Institute organized the first national Surface Design Conference at the University of Kansas in 1976. Two hundred people were expected to attend, but over 600 enthusiastic people came, which affirmed the need to organize an association that would facilitate communication between artists, designers, students, teachers, etc.

The first step was taken and in 1977, the Surface Design Association was founded and the Surface Design Journal was published. Initially this was an 8-page, black and white newsletter, but it gradually grew to 76-page full-color magazine. This community now 35 years old has nearly 4,000 members worldwide and its goals continue to “inspire creativity, encourage innovation and advocate for artistic excellence as the global leader in textile-inspired art and design” (www.surfacedesign.org).

Surface design surrounds us everywhere we look. The piece below was created by an Dorothy Wedderburn. It is entitled: air/inside and outside, and it is made out of polyester fibers using a technique called Devore. Apparently, Devore is apparently very easy to do and it can create amazing results right away. The way it works is by drawing on the fabric (with a squeeze bottle) with an acidic product called Fiber Etch. This product has the unique property of dissolving the cellulose but leaving other fibers like silk untouched. So if one was to draw with it on a rayon/silk blend, then rinse the product out, the rayon is dissolved leaving a “cut work” design where the rayon was, leaving an amazing looking textile!