Upcoming Workshops:

2008 Workshops:  

May 2-4, 2008:  Hands Across the Valley Quilters Guild, Amherst, MA,
"Making Your Mark" and lecture.

October 8 – 10:  Fabrications Retreat, Gamble Resort, Lewiston, Michigan.
“It’s All About the Stitch” (3-day class on freemotion machine embroidery).

October 15-18:  Pro Chemical and Dye, Falls River, MA.,
“Monoprinting” (4-day class using both dyes and fabric paints).

2009 Workshops:  

March 15-20:  Quilting Adventures, Kerrville, Texas (near San Antonio). “Glorious Textures on Painted Surfaces.” (5-day fabric painting, layering and hand stitching class)

Please email Jeanne for more information: beckwriter@aol.com.
Workshops and Services Available:

Private Studio Days: One of the best ways to learn a new surface design technique or process is to spend one-on-one time together in my studio rather than in a class setting with many other students. Choose one of the following: Basic dyeing techniques, dye painting, monoprinting, discharge with thiorea dioxide, resists (chemical or mechanical), composing a layered surface, thermofax screen printing. Each subject is available as one or two day sessions.
Cost: $200 per day includes dyes or paints and auxiliaries, tools. Student provides fabric. Limited openings.

Mentoring: If you already know lots of processes and techniques but would like feedback on works-in-progress and help in identifying ways to move your work forward, develop an artist statement or focus on a body of work, I am happy to consult with you by phone and/or e-mail.
Cost: $40 per hour. Limited openings.
The following workshops are available as two, three or five day classes:




It's All About the Stitch

First you’ll learn a number of free motion embroidery stitches that will include mossing, sparkle, cable and garnet stitches. Then you’ll work with your own silks, sheers and cottons to create small original compositions using a variety of layering, fusing and stitching combinations. You’ll build textural surfaces with free motion embroidery stitches as well as explore color and pattern combinations and how they can impact your overall composition.


Composing on Cloth

Begin or expand your knowledge of fabric painting with a day of working with some versatile painting techniques that include: painting washes and gradations of color, painting wet into dry, using salt resist and masks, fabric manipulation techniques like pleating, wrapping and stitching. Then, working with silks, cottons and sheers painted in class and/or brought from home, spend time exploring and discussing how to combine and layer your fabrics to make interesting compositions for stitching and embellishing at home.
Making Your Mark

In this printing workshop, you’ll work with transparent and opaque fabric paints and learn how to print just about everything, including your body parts! You'll make wonderful marks and patterns on fabric with simple tools that you'll create yourself. You can explore carving your own stamps as well as make heat impress and scored foam blocks. You'll also learn how to make a variety of block stamps with household sponges, cotton string, cardboard or wood scraps and weather stripping. Bring some vegetables or fruit and discover what lovely prints you can make with them. After this fast-paced and fun class, you will never look at your local hardware store and supermarket quite the same way again.


Glorious Textures on Painted Surfaces: Machine Embroidery

In this comprehensive class we'll explore fabric painting and building textures with layering and stitching. We will create base fabrics by painting fusible web, scrunching and fusing painted cheesecloth and scrim to a base surface and/or layering sheers and other fabrics so we can cut back into them. Then we'll add additional layers of texture with free motion machine embroidery stitches, from straight stitch "fillers" to highly textural mossing and garnet stitches. By the end of the class, you will have a variety of texture samples and several small projects close to completion.


Glorious Textures on Painted Surfaces: Hand Stitching

This class focuses on exploring spontaneous painting techniques that include monoprinting, spraying, stamping and manipulating cloth and fusible web to create abstract patterns on a variety of fabrics, then building layered textural surfaces to make small works that have an organic feel. Working with silks, felts, linens, polyesters, cottons, cheesecloth, tyvek and scrim, we'll create fabrics with an eye for color and texture, then cut, rip, layer, distort and fuse them to surfaces prepared with painted fusible web. We'll explore how to transform traditional hand embroidery stitches into exciting contemporary surface treatments using embroidery floss and silk ribbon. You can complete several small works or a number of samples during the class.
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