VCA Mark Making With Thread

The students in the Victoria College of Art Mark Making With Thread, Textile Arts course are producing some exciting samples.
A selection of their colour studies in various stages of progress.

Exploring ways to open up the ground cloth to create negative spaces.

Colour Studies

In the Mark Making With Thread course at Victoria College of Art last week we spent time doing colour studies.

Students at Victoria College of Art

Here are the early twentieth century students in the Bank Street school . . .

Here are the twenty first century students in the school on Bank Street, 100 years later.

The 3 windows you can see . . .

. . . are the 3 lowest ones on the side of the school, in front of the girls' steps.

Studio is Ready

Sunday evening Ron and I cleaned all of the furniture, windows, mirrors and hand basins.

Here i am practicing sitting in my tutorial chair.

This is the ironing station and the cutting station.
The 3 big print tables will get wheels so they can be rolled out into the centre of the room when needed.
The room needs another row of floor tiles because even though the freshly painted blue floor looks nice, i think it will get very cold underfoot come winter.

Finally, the studio is ready enough for students who will arrive in 12 hours.

Final Studio Preparations

On Saturday Ryan was hired to do some of the remaining jobs to get the studio ready before the course started on Monday.
He sanded and scraped 3 large tables that were covered in cement blobs, plaster splatter and an assortment of other lumpy stuff. He then painted the tables and converted them to work tables where we can do dying, painting, collaging .....
He stayed late to paint the vestibule area.

On Sunday Ryan was there again to move the furniture into the studio. I think he went home.

He brought his friend Joel in to help. Between them they had all of the furniture in place, cork board bolted in place and shelving moved in no time. Then they moved up stairs to work on the Animation studio which is also under renovation.

Meanwhile, Ron and I continued cleaning furniture, polishing glass table tops and putting equipment in place.

Setting up Textile Studio

Yesterday morning i shopped for supplies for the new textile arts studio at Victoria College of Art.
In the afternoon I finished off painting the edge of the floor.
Ron and Barb McCaffrey turned up and took charge of laying down the floor tiles.
This is Barb looking mischievous. She has a plan.

When Barb arrived and saw the damaged grey side of the tiles laid out she was disappointed the room didn't look as new as it should. So she and Ron pulled them all up again and stacked them according to colour. Barb eliminated the pink tiles and with Ron worked out a pattern to use the remaining 3 colours.

When i returned from a meeting, i found this. It looks great. Just the effect i wanted - stimulating and not like any one's living room. Thank you Barb and Ron.

While we have been cleaning and painting, George, the Victoria College of Art illustration/animation instructor, has been upstairs above us painting a mural on his computer studio wall.
Here it is complete, another inspirational studio in the college.

Painting Painting

I put in another 9 hours of painting in the studio yesterday.

Thankfully Ron arrived, with hot tea and cookies, then painted with me for 4 hours. We were able to finish the main room. Yippee!

This is our paint station out in the vestibule area. The vestibule still needs painting.
While waiting for the floor to dry, i am having the day at home working on my dissertation rewrites.

Progress in the Studio

My husband, Ron and i spent the whole day and into the early evening painting today.
Here is the vestibule area where the heavy furniture that can't be taken out of the room sits, we have moved it and painted.

The washroom walls looked in OK condition after a power wash so the room just got a painted floor and trim.

The far end of the main room now has a fresh coat of paint on the ceiling, walls and floor. The trim needs another coat then the floor edge can be finished. Now the room is starting to look better.

The other end of the main room still needs to be done.
And the vestibule needs finishing. So still another couple of days of painting left to do. But progress is being made.

Painting the Studio

When i arrived at the college this morning, this is what the main room of the studio looked like. Still chaotic.

I painted 2 coats of dark pumpkin orange trim, appropriate because it is Halloween.

And another bit of punchy trim in the wash room.

Wow, but this is too much punch. I wanted to see what it would be like. Now i know and i will be changing it - blue or white?

Cleaning the Studio

Then Ron moved inside with the power washer. I got to use a power tool too - the Shop Vac. While Ron sprayed water I sucked it up along with black dirt, grit and 100 years worth of loose paint. See the suction head in the bottom i am trying to operate while taking a picture and trying to avoid being sprayed by water, all at the same time.

The walls and ceiling in the storage and locker rooms is in good condition after cleaning so won't need painting. The floor washed up well and will get a new coat of paint.
I cleaned all of the bathroom stalls and enjoyed it because they are fantastic. The walls are thick slabs of slate with lots of faint graffiti accumulated over the years. The doors are heavy solid wood. The metal fittings are all brass and nickle.

One lot of graffiti i found protected behind a spare door in one of the stalls and I washed around it because it is so interesting.
My guess is it appeared when the building was still an elementary school because the drawing was done by a shorter person. Peter, the president of the college, thinks it is post-WWII- early 50s, going by the style of the planes.
I cleaned the spare door and put it back to continue protecting this bit of history.

Now the studio is clean - you could eat off the floors! But we are still going backwards as far as how the rooms look.
We are leaving the rooms for a couple of days to dry out then Keith, the custodian of the building, will put all of the furniture temporarily back in place for the classes being held in the rooms this week.
Painting is the next stage.

Power Washing

We pulled up all of the dusty floor tiles.

When classes had finished for the day, Ron brought his power washer to the school and cleaned tiles until it was too dark to see.
Next day, Saturday, we went back in the morning to finish cleaning the rest.
We stacked them against the building while they dried. It was a wild, windy day and threatening to rain any moment. When a tile was getting dry it was obviously lighter and the wind would pick it up and send it spinning across the playground (there is an elementary school nextdoor). my job was to lay out the tiles, turn them over so the other side could be washed, put the washed ones in the sun to dry and chase the ones flying around the yard.

The main room...

...and vestibule ready to be power washed.
Then Ron moved inside and power washed all the ceilings, walls and floors.