Friday, May 18, 2012

A Visit to Artistic Artifacts

Batik panels
Yesterday, I made a trip to Artistic Artifacts in Alexandria, Virginia. It's been a while since I last visited. I know the owner, Judy Gula, through our fiber guild and cooperative gallery. I saw the business in its fledgling stages and was excited to see how it's grown since then.

Artistic Artifacts or "The Annex", is housed in a warehouse-type building. As you walk through the door, you are transported into a world of colorful fabrics, yarns, paints and the ephemera used by mixed-media and quilt artists. You can get lost looking at all these goodies.
Hand dyed textiles

A great supply of bonding materials. I bought some of the Mistyfuse.
Surface design products: Shiva Paintstiks, texture plates, markers, stencils

Colorful batik fabrics
Artistic Artifacts carries the Stewart Gill Paint line

A nice selection of hand dyed yarns

In addition, Judy recently bought Batik Tambal. I was amazed by the colorful Indonesian textiles and batik panels along with a great selection of copper batik stamps. This fish panel was a real beauty!
I loved this batik panel!
A large selection of copper batik stamps

I've been asked to put together some proposals for teaching at The Annex, in particular a class in doll making. I can imagine what fun it will be to incorporate some of these amazing textures and fabrics into my dolls!

6 comments:

  1. Those batik stamps are amazing. Is Stewart Gill a similar product to the Setacolor?

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  2. The stamps were amazing! The photo shows fewer than half of the choices.
    Don't know too much about the paint line...made in Scotland..hand mixed. I'll try to get more info. If you go to their site you can get prices.

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  3. I saw (and bought) some gorgeous batiks while traveling in Malaysia and Sri Lanka this past January - one of the best parts of the trip was visiting a batik factory and watching all the steps involved in producing these beautiful fabrics. Some are stamped and some are hand painted. You can tell a true batik, apparently, by flipping it over and seeing the mirror image on the back with the same colors. Probably something all you fiber artists have always known, but it was a newly acquired fact for me!

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  4. Carolyn..I am envious! I would love to see the artisans in action. I don't know if you remember but when I was in middle school (did we know each other then?), I did a report on batik. This was when there was maybe one or at most two books in English on the subject. I arranged to go to the Metropolitan Museum in NYC and was able to go "behind the scenes" to view and handle some of the collection of batiks...it was amazing!

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  5. Didn't know you until you were in 11th grade and I moved next door and entered 10th! Maybe you should start planning a trip to Asia! I'd go with you!

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    1. I now remember it was high school (senior moment)though we got so close so fast that it seems longer. Don't know if I could get Mark to make that trip...but, wouldn't mind a "girls" trip...sounds exciting!

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