Ancestors from the North
Inspired by petroglyphs from Bohslan, Sweden
When I studied in Sweden I would often go with my adopted father, Elof, on long walks over to the pre-Viking rock paintings near his family farm in Bohslan, Sweden. It was there I found great inspiration for my ancestor series done in the Egatagasuri technique.
Egatagasuri, a contemporary use of a traditional Japanese dye technique, Katazome. Katazome applied to warp threads thusly called, Egatagasuri. I carved images into persimmon soaked, smoked stencil paper, lacquered the stencil for durability. The stencil was then laid on the warp threads, rice paste pulled over, after drying, dye applied, cloth woven, then paste washed out resulting in an ‘ikat effect’ image. After the cloth was woven a second application of paste was applied using traditional Katazome techniques to achieve the clear crisp image in the center.