A Brief History
Back in 1999, at a Board meeting of the IMDI, while sitting around Miriam’s wonderful round white table, the idea was evolved to open the IMDI up to actual international membership, by creating a “Bulletin” of some sort, that would briefly explain the educational purpose history of the IMDI, and that we could take this newsletter to the next Symposium in Norway and invite attending fiber artists members at the Symposium to join the International Mushroom Dye Institute.
IMDI Historian Dorothy Beebee started compiling information about the history of Miriam Rice’s exploration of fungal fiber arts and began gathering news from international fiber artists excited to explore this new art form that was introduced to them through Miriam’s first book, Let’s Try Mushrooms for Color. This resulted in the first IMDI Newsletter in 2000, The International Mushroom Dye-Gest.
The first issue of the newsletter gave a brief history of Miriam’s experiments with mushroom dyeing and polypore papermaking, as well as announcing the formation of the new IFFF at the Norway Symposium in 1999. After eleven issues, with many international articles contributed from overseas, the Dye-Gest would further evolve into the Mushrooms for Color website in 2007, sponsored by the IMDI.
By opening the IMDI to supporting memberships, we were able to utilize membership donations to continue building our mushroom dye research library, provide travel grants to financially enable deserving textiles artists to attend International Symposia, and further build the bridge of communication with mushroom dyers/textile artists around the world.
Complete pdfs of each Dye-Gest are linked to each issue below.
#1 – Fall/Winter 2000
The first issue of the new International Mushroom Dye-Gest was printed in the Fall of 2000, and mailed out to the new members of the IMDI. It was a landmark issue, as the “Brief History” would eventually evolve into a ”History” webpage on the first Mushrooms for Color website in 2006, and eventually become the background history for Miriam’s third book Mushrooms for Dyes, Paper, Pigments & Myco-Stix in 2007!
- “A brief history of 30 years of Mushroom Dyes” by Dorothy Beebee
- “The Possibilities of Paper and Pigments” by Miriam C. Rice
- “The Formation of the ”International Federation of Fungi and Fiber” by Carol Lee
#2 – Fall/Winter 2001
The first two issues of The International Dye-Gest were entirely in black and white, compiled as Word documents, printed and mailed out by the Board of Directors of the IMDI.
- “Report on the 10th International Fungi & Fibre Symposium in Rovaniemi, Finland” by Carol Lee
- “Explorations with the Dyeball, Experiments with Pisolithus tinctorius” by Loren Washburn
- “Colourful Letters from our members and Mushroom Dye Instructors”
- “Sharing the Colours Project” – A video about the 10th Symposium in Finland
As the international membership in the IMDI grew, the Dye-Gest expanded with articles contributed by fiber artists from Sweden and Norway including color photos for the first time.
- The Colour Congress of 2002,” held in Iowa, USA by Andrea Marks
- “Mushroom Dye class at Umea University, in Sweden” by Hjordis Lundmark
- “Mushroom Dye News from Norway” by Anna-Elise Torkelsen
- “Mushroom Dyed Scarves by School children” by Carla Mueller, Sweden
This isssue included articles from Australia, England, Scotland, Sweden, and Finland as well as Alaska!
- “Colours to Dye For” A report from Scotland by Janette McKeown (with color photos)
- “Report from Lincolnshire, England” by Jean Mounter, England
- “About Chrome and Chromates” by Dr. Erik Sundstrom
- “Mushroom Dyeing in Alaska” by Carol Lee (with color photos)
- “Anthraquinones from Dermocybe sanguinea” by Riika Raisanen, Finland
- “News From Australia & the 11th International Fungi & Fibre Symposium“ by Katrina Syme
- “A Search for Dyes with Year-round Potential” by Megan Romberg, USA
- “Experiments in Mushroom Dyeing at Goa University” by Dr. Nandkumar Kamat, India
- “Celebration of the 10th Anniversary of the Norwegian Mushroom Dye Group” (with color photos)
- “Caution Advised – Chrome hazards lurking the mordant Potassium Dichromate” by Darvin DeShazer, USA
- “Letters to the Editor about the Hazards of Using Chrome Mordants” by Carol Lee & Jim Swayne
This issue was devoted entirely to color photos and text reporting on the Fiber Arts workshops had been conducted at the 11th International Fungi & Fibre Symposium held in 2003 in Western Australia.
- “Dyeing with Xanthoria parietina” by Henrietta Glen, Australia
- “Tapestry Weaving on the Trishary Loom” by Trisha Gow, Scotland
- “Amazing Myco-Stix” by Dorothy Beebee, USA
- “Dyeing with Fungi for Beginners” by Nessie Henshaw, Australia
- “Dyeing with Gymnopilus” by Andreya Marks, USA
- “Pisolithus Dyes” by Kirsti Palmén, Finland
- “Experiments in Dyeing with Australian Fungi” by Anna-Elise Torkelson, Norway
- “Illustration and Documentation Workshop” by Dorothy Beebee, USA
- “Dyes from Australian Dermocybes” by Hjördis Lundmark, Mattias Andersson, & Hans Marklund, Sweden
- “Reversible Knitting & Heliograms Workshops” by Marilyn Caddell, Scotland
- “Dyeing Cotton” by Peggy Buckingham, Australia
- “Body Adornment Workshop” by Nalda Searles, Australia
- “Forrum of Soppfargere/ The Norwegian Mushroom Dyers (in Norwegian & English)” by Anna-Elise Torkelsen, Norway
- “How I became interested in Mushroom Dyeing” by Betsy Samuelsen, Norway
- “Color from Omphalotus olearius” by Ken Olson, USA
- “The 12th International Fungi & Fibre Symposium, 2005” by Mycological Society of Denmark
- “Mushroom Dyeing in Denmark and Recollections from the 3rd Fungi & Fibre Symposium in Sorö, Denmark” 1985 by Flemming Rune (in Danish and English)
- “Continental Drift” 1985 by Tigerlily Jones, USA
- “The Dyer Cortinarius” by Carol Lee, USA
- “Workshops to be offered at the 12th International Fungi & Fibre Symposium”
- “Textiles arose for the Forest” by Riika Räisänen, Finland
- “Dye Class in Mendocino” by Florentine Whyte, USA
- “A Marvelous Mycologist” by Carol Lee, USA
- “Somewhere” by Andrea von Waldenfels-Marks, USA
- “The Variable Sarcodon laevigatus” by Connie Nelson, USA
- “Cocktails – Mixing and Overdyeing with Mushrooms” by Lena Larsen, Sweden
- “Mushroom Incident – Eating Dermocybes!” by Anna Moore, USA
- “Overdyeing Fungi Dyes with Indigo” by Katrina Syme, Western Australia
#11 was the last International Mushroom Dye-Gest, and in 2006 the Mushrooms for Color Website was designed by Dorothy Beebee to carry on the fungal fiber art international communication from 2006 until 2018.
As our internet communication devices evolved beyond the desktop, the time came to upgrade and redesign this website to meet the needs of new devices. Miriam’s daughter, Felicia Rice, took on the task with Dorothy Beebee to redesign and upgrade the original website. In December 2021 a new mushroomsforcolor.com emerged to carry forth the fungal/fiber torch!