Silk Painting

Some of Nancy's silk paintings can be seen at www.nancygoldmanart.com

Painting on silk scarf is a fantastic art that can be enjoyed by just about everyone. Even beginners can create stunning pieces to be proud of.

It is such a versatile material that you can use it to create items of decoration - such as panels, pictures, wallhangings, suncatchers, cushions etc - to practical uses like clothes, scarves, ties and bags.
Really your imagination can go wild.

It is surprisingly easy to make something beautiful just by painting different colours on to a piece of silk and watching them spread and blend and work together. By doing this you learn which colours complement each other and how to make soft and sharp patterns and shapes.

Try This at Home

1. Dab a spot of dye on to some stretched silk.
2. Add another colour to the middle of it, watch it spread.
3. Then add another colour to the middle.
4. Alternate dark and light colours for the biggest contrast. Suddenly you have a rainbow of colours.
5. Try doing these dots again elsewhere on the silk.
6. Keep going until the silk is full of colour.
7. When this is dry, use some coloured resist to draw simple daisies freehand over the silk and add spots for the centres.

Try painting the daisies again with a new piece of silk, but this time while the paint is still wet, sprinkle a few little clusters of coarse salt onto the areas that will be the centres of your daisies and leave to dry. Once dry shake the salt off the silk and draw your daisies. The salt soaks up some of the dye and leaves a mottled effect on the silk which will give your daisies a bit more depth and definition.

If you would like some more ideas for painting on silk visit my silk scarf patterns website. These patterns make silk painting easy and come with instructions so even beginners can use them. My website offers silk scarf painting patterns that you can print off right now. Please visit www.silkpaintingpatterns.com/

This is such a simple little experiment but can be amazingly effective. Everything you do will be teaching you the value of colour and the flow of the dye on the silk.