Emily Shapiro of Night Garden Farm will lead a workshop on “Foraging for Wild Color” on Saturday, Oct. 12, from 1 to 4 pm, as part of the Barrington Land Conservation Trust’s “Art in Nature” Series. The workshop will take place at Night Garden Farm in Seekonk, which is home to more than 50 species of medicinal plants and flowers.
The Art in Nature Series seeks to connect people with nature through direct engagement in the arts. Registration is limited to 12 people. The $120 workshop fee includes all materials. All registration fees benefit the presenting artist.
“We’ll have the opportunity to forage for colors from nature to use as natural dyes,” says Shapiro. “We’ll learn fabric preparation for dyeing and basic extraction methods for dye plants. We’ll also discuss the ways that wild colors help us develop deep conversations, connections, and rootedness in local landscapes, and learn self-expression with the colors of the land.”
Workshop participants will create a vibrant set of sample swatches and a bandana from colors they forage and pick around the farm.
Shapiro’s work in the Night Garden is rooted in permaculture practices, observation, and reciprocity. In addition, she grows food, makes medicines, and creates handcrafts out of what she grows. She cultivates broomcorn for brooms, willow for baskets, and a dye garden from which she transforms natural fibers into a colorful, earth-based array of tones for quilts and clothing.
“This work has given me a deep and sublime connection to color, both in the textiles and in the landscape,” says Shapiro. “As a flower farmer, I cultivate and harvest the plants and combine complimentary and contrasting colors into bouquets. I observe closely the way the light reflects the varying tones and watch which colors bees, spiders, butterflies, and other pollinators are drawn to. As an herbalist, I see the deep reds and greens of herbs in an oil or alcohol extraction, and as a flower and herb farmer and a textile artist working almost exclusively with natural dyes, I spend my days tracking color from seed to seedling, to plant to dye bath, and finally to cloth.”