Painting With Wool

Back in October my felting group took a landscape painting class using wool as paint taught by Diane Christian. This is the photograph I chose for inspiration.

We picked our palette from hand dyed wool, so many beautiful colors to choose from.

Diane brought so many various fibers that it was hard to choose what use.

Bits and pieces of yarn 

I roughly laid out a base of wool roving, mohair locks and silk. 

more layering of yarn and fiber

After finishing the layering, it gets drenched in soapy water, then rolled in plastic. We roll and roll and roll for about 1/2 until the fibers have felted together.  This is what it looked like when I was finished with the rolling. Now it's ready for the needle felting, which really brings the painting to life.

And here is the finished piece. I added a lot of texture with bits of silk (in the water), yarn (in the front and on the rocks) and wool locks (in the trees). 

Here is Paige's beginning piece...

… and completed

Sharon chose a colorful wooded scene with flowers in the foreground

I love the light coming through

Bev's photo didn't have too much color variation

but she did a great job adding more color 

and the finished piece which has a lot more light in it. We had a great time and I've wanted to get into more 'lambscape' painting. Now that my tours are over, I'll have more time to play.