From Plant to Pigment: How to make your own vibrant inks, pastels and paints
a studio manual by Natalie Stopka
from Skittledog Books
The many plants that surround and sustain us are rich with color. With a little alchemical know-how, you can transform the brilliant hues of our botanical companions from liquid dye to granular pigment, supplying myriad artistic uses as paint, ink and pastel.
Today’s art suppliers are stocked with very refined and chemically pure colors. But for those of us seeking sustainability and ecological connection, they are very far removed from nature. Inspired by the history and craft of color-making, Natalie Stopka is an artist and educator known for her explorations of handmade pigments. In From Plant to Pigment she invites us into her studio, sharing the ways she has divested her practice of non-renewable synthetics in favor of the craft of homegrown color.
Natalie's recipes transform natural dyes into vibrant and stable lake pigments. Explicating the fundamental techniques and chemistry of lakes, this book extends the applications of natural dye colors into expanded artistic media. Artists are empowered to concoct their own pigments, paints, and pastels from botanicals, with sections including:
Botanical sources: cultivating, foraging, harvesting and storing dye plants
The studio larder: essential equipment and ingredients
Lake pigments: including Natalie’s master lake pigment recipe
Other plant pigments: charcoal and indigo
Artists’ materials: using your botanical pigments to make an array of artists’ materials
Brooklyn Launch Party
!
Brooklyn Launch Party !
Hosted by Calyx Studios
Thursday, November 13
Brooklyn, NY
Join author Natalie Stopka at Calyx Studios to celebrate bounteous botanical color, the art and science of pigment-making, and regenerative artistic connection to local ecology.
Listen in on a conversation between Natalie and artisan dyer Cara Marie Piazza
Peek inside Natalie's traveling color box and hear the adventures (and misadventures) of recipe testing hundreds of hues
Enjoy snacks and drinks
Sip cocktails courtesy of Pantalones Tequila
Get your copy of From Plant to Pigment at the party, or bring one along for a personal inscription from Natalie!
From Plant to Pigment: Cook the Book
An online workshop series
Hosted by Natalie
Daunted by tackling the recipes in From Plant to Pigment? In this eight-part live online series, participants will follow along with Natalie to cook their way through the book, concocting 6+ lake pigments utilizing a variety of extraction methods, along with ink, paint, pastel, and charcoal. Working through the recipes with Natalie’s guidance will allow participants to quickly learn the operative chemistry of botanical pigments, and stock their studios with colors ready to create art. Don’t let From Plant to Pigment suffer the fate of so many art manuals and cookbooks: sitting on a shelf to gather dust, their contents unplumbed and lessons unlearned!
