Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Mexican Field Notes

We returned from a wonderful trip to Oaxaca, Mexico a couple of weeks ago. We visited weavers and a candle maker in Teotitlán del Valle. The artisans used natural dyes to color their yarns and wax. This process fascinated me. Using different lengths of time in a dye bat varied the color concentration. The color green differed depending if the moss came from the bark of a tree or a rock. For many years, cochineal insects provided the color red. I loved the use of natural resources to make the colors they needed.

Art and images copyright 2008 by Paula McNamee

3 comments:

winna said...

This is absolutely incrdible!!!

rivergardenstudio said...

I love this page with the writing and drawings, Beautiful field notes! Roxanne

Jan Harris Smith said...

This is lovely, Paula - what a great field trip piece - I envy you your opportunity to see this done with natural dyes in a natural setting