161) Sumingashi

I had read about Sumingashi, Japanese marbling, a few times but over the winter I had a chance to try it at the Mesh Baltimore Skill Share. Ever since I tried it I have been meaning to get a Sumingashi kit to try with the girls. I finally got one a few weeks ago from amazon for about $12. The kit contained 6 tubes of ink and a page of small perforated paper discs along with some instructions.

I found a large plastic tub and filled it with 2-3 inches of water. I also cut some larger newsprint paper down to a size that would easily fit in the tub. The girls then popped out one of the paper discs and floated it in the water, the disc sank just below the surface and moved around the tub. Next they selected a color and squeezed out just 1-2 drops of the ink aiming for the small paper disc as the instructions said. The Bee was pretty good at hitting the disc but the Bean's aim wasn't as good, so I was happy to find that hitting the disc didn't really seem to make to much of a difference. After the ink hit the surface of the water it begin to expand out in large rings. We then did another color and another creating a beautiful pattern. After we had added a few colors of ink we used the back of a long thin paint brush just to slowly go across the water and swirl the ink a little. Finally the girls took turn placing a piece of paper onto the surface of the water, letting it soak up the ink before carefully taking it out and setting it aside to dry. The papers quickly soaked up the ink leaving a beautiful marbled pattern. I was a little worried that the new print might be too thing but it worked perfectly.

After making our first piece we went on to make about twenty more, its kind of addicting. The girls loved using the inks and trying out the different colors. We all loved seeing what patterns would emerge. After making a bunch of papers we stopped for the day but still have most of the ink left so we will definitely have to make more soon. Anyone have any ideas what we could use our marbled papers for?