4. Biochromes¶
This week I played with pigments and natural dyes. I would like to test natural dyes from vegetal, mineral and other origins. To carry out this research, I will be working on it over the next few weeks. Below: the elements of the first afternoon of work in the FabLab.
Research¶
Friday, October 16
Test on - the Bacteria¶
Type of bacteria: Escherichia coli, Coccus Lutéus Colors: Yellow, red, blue
Prepare the fabrics and the fibres Weight the fabric and sterilize all the material (fabrics, pots, a par of tweezers,scissors,parafilm, etc...).Disinfect your hands. Put carefully the steriliezed fabrics on small pots and pour over the LB on them. Fabrics must be covered with liquid. LB solution is a rich environment; composed of yeast extract, peptone and salt.Bacteria are kept alive by this liquid.They have a lifespan of about a week,after the pigments are no longer strong enough to make dye. For for a good proliferation of bacteria, it is necessary to keep them at temperature (30 degrees for Micro Coccus Luteus and 37 degrees for Escherichia coli).
The second experience was to add Aagar Aagar in the LB solution.
Test on - the Vegetal dyes¶
- Prepare the fabrics and the fibres Weight the fabric. After sterilization, we used 2 differents types of fibre: animal with raw and satin silk and vegetal with row and popelin cotton. We weigh our fabrics and fibres.
- Prepare dye baths Choose mordants (In our case: Alun of potash and copper) We did three differents baths: Hibiscus, Garance. Cut fabrics into small swatches Weight swatches Fully submerge fabric in dye bath. We take care to simmer in low heat to avoid that some fabrics will shrink. We play ratio of dye to pH modifier with vinegar and soda ash. For this experience we don't use pH strip to measure the changes but what can I say is with the vinegar, the colors become warmer and with the soda ash: cooler. We let lab dips dry. We will record our results next week.
Useful links¶
Gallery¶
Video¶
From Vimeo¶
Sound Waves from George Gally (Radarboy) on Vimeo.