Result- Nature Imitates Nature

I have put in 37 hours at the ACAD studios over the last (nearly) two weeks... It isn't as many hours as I had planned but I always expect too much and acknowledge that I have to deal with other demands on my time.
So it is with great pleasure that I realise what I have accomplished.  I now have some (10) wonderful surfaces to work with and a procedure in place to create some more surfaces to take away with me from ACAD at the end of June.  Even if I did nothing more to them I think they are interesting enough to be pieces of art that stimulate the mind.
Here are some of the surfaces.

I am struck by how closely the surfaces I have produced imitate tree bark. Of course there is some involvment of design as I work... it isn't all serendipitous, but it is amazing how the chemical colouring of the pulp (KMn04, Fe)  especially with the iron from manufactured and decaying bits of metal produce something so remarkably similar to nature.

As Tara so aptly put it - Nature imitating nature.  The iron seeps and etches into the cotton fibrous surface, which, at a microscopic or macro level, is an uneven surface like the fibres of a plant...  and the etching is thus similar to the rain-stained and algal encrusted tree barks that I have been working from.
Further, often the iron will transfer hundreds of dots spore-like or lichen-like florets onto the paper's surface.  It is my hope that I can further enhance these surfaces with stitch to add interest.  But I have some thoughts about where to put the stitching and since I already feel an affinity to the surface nature has created for me, I feel rather precious about it....
Let's see where my thoughts go.
Meanwhile I have put more of my sheets to stain for the weekend and have got a couple on the Arashi pole too:-