5th June Building on Tradition - Batik - Jenny O'Leary

 

 Since 2005 Jenny O'Leary has been exploring and developing her work in Batik working mainly with tissue paper, hot wax, bleach and inks often combined with stitch and mixed media. She used examples of her work to illustrate her talk and explain her enthusiasm and continued passion for this technique.

 31 of us joined Jenny for her talk this afternoon.

She told us that as she is not exhibiting at the moment, so she has been creating small pieces of work inspired by her daily walks.

Hot wax is traditionally applied as a resist to white fabric. However Jenny has developed a technique of applying the wax to collaged coloured tissue. This is then bleached in areas and the inks are then reapplied. She has used beeswax, and paraffin wax but now uses soya wax.. The bleach Jenny uses is Milton and is sometimes applied through a stencil.

Jenny also uses a brushable wax in her sketchbooks as it is easier to control.

The tools she uses are the traditional Tjanting but also items such as pastry brushes, bamboo calligraphy pens and card.

Her work during lockdown is taken from the photos from her walks and not only uses the techniques described above but also monoprints and drawings on both tissue and also teabag paper. She then glues these onto Khadi paper to mount them.

Here are some images of her work

Such lovely work Jenny. Thank you for such an inspiring talk