Creating a sustainable arts practice from nature...
My foraging so far has mainly been for food, health and natural beauty products . Gathering picking then creating recipes to eat, medicines to take and creams and balms to apply.
This left me with waste products of squeezed berries, chopped up leaves and trimmings of all types. As I am trying to evolve my arts practice and incorporate these acts and rituals into my making. As someone who uses all forms of creation within their practice, it is becoming obvious that I now need to look at the materials I am using to create work with.
When I am left with waste produce or pickings now, I am going to be looking at how these can be reused, to create inks, watercolours, oils and building or drawing implements. As I hope to buy fewer and fewer “man made chemical materials”
Elderberry Ink
Each year when I gather the elderberries, I am left with a pile of waste crushed berries, the seed are toxic and so should not really been consumed in great quantities. This left me wondering, so after a bit of research I managed to find a formula that seems to work. This means I can reuse these waste berries again, there will always be some waste but not as much, and it means I can dry them out for future use.
The method I used is quite simple. After I have finished squeezing the berries for my edible preparations . I then put them back into the pan on their own to create another extraction of juice.
This juice is much less than previous, but we concentrate it after straining, to create a more intense colour.
Once cooled I added to each 100ml of juice 1 tsp salt and 1tsp vinegar this is to help preserve it. It can be used Like this or as i did , added to a resin or gum Arabic to thicken it up and create a flowing ink. From here it is ready to use or push further to create other paint types.
Golden Rod Ink
This is golden rod, and. A wild plant I had not seen before but it did hear about. I happened to drive past a small verge of tall bright yellow colourful plant as it was coming to the end of it flowering, and wondered if this was indeed golden rod. As any good forage know if you don’t know the plant take lots of photos and a small sample to try out.
This is what I did and found out I was right. It’s always a good feeling when your first instincts are write it really feels like your learning something and its is sticking with you.
I decided because I didn’t take a lot of this that I may be able to make some ink from it, as it was so very yellow, and I didn’t want to waste it.
It did seem like quite a delicate plant and started to wither quite quickly so this time I didn’t heat it, i just soaked the whole plant chopped up in warm water for 48 hours. I was going blind into this experiment and had no idea if it would work.
But it did and after 48 hours i had a yellow liquid that was very runny, next i did heat it slowly to reduce it down a bit. When it was cool I did the same thing to this as i did to the elderberry with salt, vinegar and gum Arabic.
Here I am creating the mop brush with corn husks
Well it did, I took me some time to get the hang of it, as I needed to wet them so they would twist easy and then i had to think of how to assemble it. But it looks like it has worked, I just need to get the courage up to test it out. I just don’t want it to break because i love how it looks!
Making drawing & painting tools
The idea of making my own drawing tools really intrigued me and I though it was a good challenge to set myself, this would also go hand in hand with my home made inks.
I am quite impulsive and if i get an idea i like to test it out as soon as possible, one because i will be thinking about it until i do it, and two because I didn’t want to forget about it or put it off.
But what did I have at that moment to do this, I really wasn’t sure where to start except with the obvious feathers .
Then while preparing dinner which happened to have fresh corn cobs it hit me. I was already using the cobs for dinner and soups and the silks to make a tincture, what could i use the husks for that might be different to eating with them.
I said to myself “I would if I could make a paint brush ? I knew the husks could be made in to threads for making corn dollies and a type of rope or string. Would it work for a brush?