Saturday, June 22nd
1:30 – 4pm
Tuition: $65 Members, $80 Non-Members
Materials Fee: $20
Seaweed pressing was a popular art form during the Victorian era when people summered on the coast. Seaweed was admired for its beauty and pressed into scrapbooks with other mementos like poetry, watercolors and anything that was a happy reminder of their experience. The process of pressing seaweed is a combination of art and science and drives home the point that they are inextricably linked.
This workshop introduces seaweed as a medium in art. Participants will create seaweed pressings using local specimens and learn techniques in collaging dry and wet seaweed. The seaweed pressing kits, which are like flower presses but adapted for working with this wet medium, are reusable and constructed mostly from recycled materials. You will learn about the history of seaweed as an art form and its ties to the New England coast.
You will be making a pressing of seaweed that can be framed and hung in your home once the drying process is complete.
Mary is the owner of Saltwater Studio Art & Design in Newport, Rhode Island. She received her BFA in Graphic Design and Illustration from the University of Miami and has certificates in Museum Studies from Tufts University and Appraisal Studies in Art & Antiques from RISD/ American Society of Appraisers.
Mary is an artist who explores the marine environment for inspiration in her artwork.
Her Marine Botanical pressings and collages are created from seaweed and organic elements collected on excursions primarily throughout the New England coast.
Seaweed pressing was a popular art form during the Victorian era when people summered on the coast. Seaweed was admired for its beauty and pressed into scrapbooks with other mementos like poetry, watercolors & anything that was a happy reminder of their experience.
“After seeing some of these scrapbooks I was compelled to explore this process and use seaweed as a medium in my work. I love to show people my process and methods!”