2nd Workshop of Textiles: Printing and Embroidering

Friday, February 19, 2016

Art was born since the human took his first breath. 

Arts exist in all of us. It is wonderful when we allow it to flow.

Nature provides us wonderful elements that can inspire us.

In this workshop we were challenged.

In this workshop we learned the wonderful fabric printing technique. This form of art gives us the possibility to create marvelous patterns and to play with interesting shapes and colors in a piece of textile. You can print several silhouettes from different kinds of elements.

You can think about interesting shapes to create new printing´s patterns.

Thinks that you can use for this technique:

       Hands and foot;

       Nature’s elements (leaves, flowers, vegetables and fruits);

       Sponges;

       Stamps;

       Bubble´s plastic;

       Other objects from our daily life.

The teacher asked us to print three pieces of fabric and try to respect the order of the elements along the space.

During the second part of the session we created an embroidery piece using a needle and threads. These materials can be used in different ways. It exists different kinds of threads and needles, adapted for the different types of works.

All this work led me think!

Printing on fabric can be a very ecological technique. The colors used in the printing should be chemical-free. This technique allows the children to make new and beautiful patterns in an old piece of textile. They can also use it to decorate t-shirts or to ornament some of the classroom’s textiles, like, for example, pillowcases, carpets or storyteller’s mat.

Directly into the fabric, the child will compose a harmonious  “text” made of figures and colors.

The child uses mathematical knowledge along the work. It organizes the elements over the textile and respect the sequence of the figures, while the pattern is being created. This demands working with mathematics.

Embroidering can be very relaxing. This kind of activity transmits tranquillity. It brings the child to a calm state of mind.  When a child seems being restlessly this is a good way to cool it down.

When a child enters into the embroidering process the world seems to stop for a while.  This kind of tasks requires a lot of concentration. During the handiwork hands and brain got deeply attached to each other.

The small and gentle finger´s moves develops the fine motor skills from the child. For children can be easier to embroidering in a cardboard because of it's stable and firm. The child can perforate the cardboard as its wishes, creating new shapes.

When the pedagogue prepares this activity must organize properly the threads, so can be easy for the children to use the materials.

In such tranquillity and relaxing labour, the child will meditate with a needle and a thread on its hands.