My name is Sue Bleiweiss and I am a fiber artist living in Massachusetts. I use Jacquard Dye-Na-Flow paints from Dharma Trading to handpaint the sheets of silk fusion that I create using unspun tussah silk and soy silk fibers. I became intrigued with the art of making silk fusion in 2005 and once I discovered the versatility of working with the sheets of paper that I created with the process I knew that I had found a medium that I wanted to explore in depth.

Silk fusion is created by layering silk fibers between sheets of nylon netting, soaking and then treating it with a textile medium or stiffener. While wet, I hand paint the fusion using Jacquard Dye-Na-Flow paints. I prefer the Dye-na-flow paints because they give me the color range that I like without having to worry about mixing and creating my own colors. I use them straight from the bottle and they work perfectly to color the silk fibers.

The result of this fusion of silk, textile medium and paint is a sheet of shimmering silk paper, which can be dried flat or molded into sculptural objects. The flat silk paper can be used to construct three dimensional objects such as boxes, lampshades, bowls, masks, jewelry, journal covers and more. Essentially anything that you can create with traditional paper or fabric you can make with silk fusion. Visit my website at www.suebleiweiss.com to see more of my work.

Sue B
www.suebleiweiss.com
Online classes: http://tinyurl.com/mf7b5
Blog: http://suebthreads.blogspot.com/