Making  charcoal and bio char every morning. Turned off the gas furnace and heating the house with our wood stove only until October. Every time we make a fire in our living room wood stove, we make charcoal, from owl pellets, spent coffee grounds, bark from backyard trees, grape vines from backyard, bamboo, thistle seed pods, found fish bones, toilet paper inner tubes, pine cones and acorn caps.....

Spent and charred coffee ground drawings, image made by scraping grounds into shapes. This charcoaled material ended up having fluffy and light qualities, a very airy substance to play with and such an abundant cultural and agricultural subject. Researching and learning about SONA Drawings, Kolam Cultural Traditions and the Tibetan Buddhist Sand Mandalas.

I am currently experimenting with charcoaling Mimosa Tree Seedpods and Chestnut Husks, in our living room wood stove. After the charcoaling process, I grind the materials into fine powders, mix them with my Soya Milk binder and paint on Mulberry paper. The banner on the right is made with 12 Chestnut Husks and the banner on the left is made with 12 Mimosa Seed Pods. In addition, the whitish strokes have been made with Eggshell Paint which am learning how to make and use. And the brownish ink is made from avocado pits.
The imagery, unconsciously, pays homage to Art Brut, Jean Dubuffet, Chaco and Maya Pottery, Bridget Riley, Keith Haring, Laszlo Maholy Nagy, Paul Klee, Nazca drawings, road maps, Haida and Salish art Forms, my own Mapuche Ancestors and everything I have ever looked at, really looked at, because everything has made an impression.

Back and forth image making, painting on and scratching off, on 8.5 x 11 watercolour paper

Katazome (型染め) is a Japanese method of dyeing fabrics using a resist paste applied through a stencil, typically a rice flour mixture applied with a brush or a tool such as a palette knife. Unlike yūzen, stencils are used repeatedly to make a repeating pattern. Pigment is added by hand-painting, immersion dyeing, or both. The area of the fabric covered and permeated by the paste mixture resists the later application of dye, thus creating undyed areas within the fabric.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katazome

Learning about Katazome techniques and materials, stencils, resist rice paste, soya milk binder, Mulberry paper, etc. so that I can apply to my carbon project.

Work in Progress, painting made with chestnut husk charcoal paint and white chalk on Mulberry paper, 3' x 7'

Process - inkblots on Mulberry paper (4feet x 1.5feet) painted with charcoal paint made from one chestnut husk and one happy chicken egg yolk.

Quantifying  process and progress.
One charcoaled chestnut husk + one egg yolk +  1 tblp water/vinegar = 1 oz. of black ink/paint

272 Divided 817 pits into thirds, 1 third stays in its original form, 2 thirds get charcoaled and 1 third of that gets turned into ink/paint. 272 pits fit into 1 little can retort. Home wood stove firing over several hours.

817 Prune Plum pits, collected from harvested plums from our front and backyards, dehydrated and frozen for the year's consumption. Pits dried and counted, will be charcoaling and processing for ink, paint and solid substance possibilities.

Collecting in an Atmospheric River: Butternuts, Chestnuts and Black Walnuts collected on Mountain View Community Trail and surrounding area for char-coaling, drying, dyeing, inks, paint and content.
Big Thank you to the Schwichtenberg Family and the District of Kent for making this beautiful trail.

Lichen on Tree Bark

Oat Charcoal - egg yolk binder - material qualities noted, lends itself to 3D investigations. Mixing ink paint on palette makes me think of Franz Kline

Collaborations with a Day Job and Cedar Isle Farm
Explorations with Oat chaff, a different wood stove, and a new Ink
Cleaning Oat Grain and using the discard grain to make Oat Ink for the farm