Deconstructing the Screen

I finally had a chance to deconstruct my Mimosa screen this afternoon. Having learned that the first few pulls of the squeegee often don't produce top notch results, I wasn't too terribly disappointed in this, my first draw:

What I did like was the great delineation of the small leaflets, which I think you can see if you click and enlarge the photo.

This is drag number three, with a bit more color coming off of the dried screen:


By the time I had done a couple more draws my ADD was taking over and I was getting pretty darned bored, so I decided to add some color to my remaining soda ash activated print paste. I divided what I had left into two batches and added a scarlet red to one and lemon yellow to the other. Realizing that I could easily make some mud if I wasn't careful, I only drew the print paste across the screen enough times to produce one complete draw. I was livin' then! The red wasn't quite as awesome as I had hoped, but the yellow produced some nice color. Then I decided that I didn't like the first three pulls at all, so I went back over them, the first two with yellow and the third one with the red. Here is the sum total of my 'work':

So, the top three are overdyed pulls, the middle three are pulls 4-6, and the bottom are pulls with first red and then yellow dye added.

Here is my waste paste as I was preparing to wash it down the drain:

Isn't that pretty?

Now my question is (and I hope Rayna will comment), is there anything worth saving on the screen? Here it is:

I think next time I would remove the Mimosa leaves, as two of the three stuck (as you can plainly see). The middle branch came off easily and there is still a lot of dried dye paste there. I don't think it is of any value though........but if it is, I don't want to waste it!

Between the monoprints that I was able to take off of the newsprint when I was preparing the screen, and these deconstructed prints, I think I can make an interesting wallhanging.

PEACE