10 . 20

turtle island lakes : october ‘20

A ‘lake’ pigment is a pigment that’s made by dyeing a powdered mineral, like alum, with a botanical dye, like weld, transforming the liquid dye into a dry pigment that can be used to make paint. This month, four different artists contributed lake pigments to Wild Pigment Project: Julie Beeler (Hopi Sun Flower), Avalon Paradea (Pōpolo), Natalie Stopka (Weld) and Ashlee Weitlauf (Pansy, Tulip & Rose). Laking is a multi-step, very time consuming process, which for these generous lakers involved growing or wild foraging plants, making a dye bath, producing a chemical reaction in the dye bath with two different materials (alum and potash or calcium), and then washing, filtering, drying and grinding the pigment. Each laker made multiple small batches of lakes — it was truly a many-houred labor of love. The name ‘TURTLE ISLAND LAKES’ was chosen to designate the group.

contributors : ashlee weitlauf, avalon paradea, natalie stopka, and julie beeler

Turtle Island Pansy, Tulip, and Rose were produced by Ashlee Weitlauf, from flowers grown in her garden. Ashlee is a book artist exploring natural pigments. While working as a book conservator at the University of Oregon Knight Library she was introduced to the research of history professor Vera Keller. This introduction to Keller’s work inspired the exploration of pigments. She is a seed and plant enthusiast who finds the convergence of plants and pigments to be irresistible. Currently, she is obsessed with making lakes out of every plant in her backyard (as well as wanting to find and grow from seed just about every plant she meets). Be sure to check out Ashlee’s beautiful and informative website for all sorts of laking inspiration, including historical color wheels composed entirely of lake pigments. www.ashleeweitlauf.com

Turtle Island Pōpolo was made by Avalon Paradea. Avalon writes: ‘I am an artist from the ahupuaʻa of Waikōloa, Kohala, Hawaiʻi island. I have been involved in ʻāina (land) based arts since 2016. My interests lie primarily in making kapa (bark cloth), working with local plant dyes, and creating/ painting with earth and lake pigments. Most of the materials I use in my art are tenderly foraged from the land, an activity that I find deeply grounding. 

Pōpolo (Solanum americanum, black nightshade) is an herbaceous plant indigenous to Hawaiʻi. This plant has numerous uses in lāʻau lapaʻau. traditional Hawaiian medicine. The leaves can be used as a poultice for bruising and broken bones, the juice as a laxative, and the ripe berries to treat thrush. Pōpolo is a tough little plant, often thriving in disturbed areas. The etymology of pōpolo is debated, but most point to the deep purple berries as a source for this term, with "pō" referring to darkness. In turn, this word has long been used as local slang for people of African heritage. Follow Avalon on Instagram at @avalon.dawn.art.

This Hopi Sunflower lake was made with flower heads grown by Julie Beeler. Hopi Sunflowers have been grown by Hopi Peoples for more than 6,000 years. Imported to Europe in the 1500s, they were bred into new varieties which almost wiped out the heirloom sunflowers when they were returned to the North American continent in the 1800s. But they have always been protected on Hopi lands, where they are considered by some to be the fourth “sister,” after corn, beans and squash. Hopi Sunflower dye is usually a purple-to-black hue, which the laking chemistry transforms into a rich olive color.

Julie is an alchemist. She experiments with the unpredictability of plants by growing and harvesting, observing and foraging, and tethering herself to nature’s seasons. Blooming and dyeing takes time. She smells, cooks, immerses and bundles up plants, blooms, leaves, seeds, roots, berries, and bark. Her textiles are imbued with these earthly colors and botanical prints, layer by layer, color upon color. To learn more about Julie & see her rich offering of courses, please go to www.bloomanddye.com

This Weld lake was produced by Natalie Stopka. Natalie is a New York-based artist focused on creative processes rooted in the materials and forces of the natural world. Her pursuit of historical surface patterning techniques includes natural dyeing, pigment extraction, marbling, and printmaking. These meticulous, layered processes incorporate materials grown in her studio garden, creating a seasonally evolving vocabulary of texture and color.

Weld has been prized by dyers for centuries for its brilliant yellow hues and light-fastness. The plant can spread easily, so dyers who grow weld are careful to keep it contained. Natalie’s Weld lake has been “saddened” — darkened towards the green spectrum slightly through the addition of iron.

To read more about Natalie’s work, and see her offering of excellent online classes, please go to: www.nataliestopka.com

22% donation recipients : Indigenous Environmental Network and the Pōpolo Project

This month’s contributors chose the name TURTLE ISLAND LAKES as an acknowledgment of the lands where the plants used to make their pigments were grown or foraged. ‘Turtle Island,’ is a term used in some Indigenous cultures to refer either to the continent also called ‘North America,’ or, alternatively, to the planet as a whole. Since the 1970s, the term has been widely used by both Indigenous and non-Indigenous activists working for Indigenous rights. Three-fourths of this month’s 22% donation went to the Indigenous Environmental Network, an alliance of grassroots Indigenous Peoples whose mission is “to protect the sacredness of Mother Earth from contamination and exploitation by strengthening, maintaining and respecting Indigenous teachings and natural laws.” To donate directly to IEN, please go to: www.ienearth.org

The remaining quarter of the donation went to the Pōpolo Project, “a Hawai‘i-based nonprofit organization that redefines what it means to be Black in Hawai‘i and in the world through cultivating radical reconnection to ourselves, our community, our ancestors, and the land, changing what we commonly think of as Local and highlighting the vivid, complex diversity of Blackness.” To donate directly to the Pōpolo Project, please go to www.thepopoloproject.org