WIP 8_13_10

State of Emergency

The title for this page came from the fact that I was listening to Bjork's Joga on continuous repeat the whole time I was drawing.

Once again, I found an old sketch to redo and refashion. I took three days to complete it and am pretty happy with the result although let me tell you, the process was flippin' fantastic too. I redid the girl in acrylics, then her face with colored pencil. The background though was where I got stuck. What to do? Keeping that in the back of my mind, I decided to tune into Blade (The Artistic Biker's) Ustream when I began to doodle Mehndi designs with my micron pen. I got so lost in the process that I didn't even realize I had spent two full hours just doodling various designs against the teal background of my newly painted muse.

A prompt for your own page: When you journal, take your sweet time. Take not one but two or three days to complete. Do it in stages. Fill every corner with something small, new and interesting. Then let it sit for another day or two. Then look at it, does it feel done? Then it probably is.

The Good. The Bad. The Second Chance.

One of the things that I had to learn with Art Journaling is the fact that not everything has to be pretty or even finished. I can stop mid page, decide I'm not feeling it and move on to the next. This is liberating, this is creative freedom. In my mind, art journaling doesn't have a destination in mind, just a journey to take you on. Lately, I've been looking over some unfinished sketches and abandoned ideas and making them into something new. Old thoughts creating a new creative path.




The above page was done over a year ago. I was experimenting with my water soluble crayons and antiquing technique, throwing a quick but utterly uninspiring sketch up there for good measure. Then, I was done. I moved on. Over a year and a half later (by my estimation) I was flipping through that old moleskine (now about two/three years in the making) and found many old sketches and abandoned pages that I was beginning to see with new eyes.




Imagine if I just said, "Well, can't do anything with this. It's been over a year and what's done is done?" Yeah, I can't either. I'm very happy with the result and am now looking into recreating a few more pages just for the fun of it.

Lesson to take away from this: It's not over until you say it's over. Don't limit yourself just because you put it away. Find inspiration in old ideas and refashion them into something new. You'll be glad that you did.

Sparkly rainbows and gumdrops am I

I started a new journal. Well, started in the usual ways I start things, which means that I have two or three in the process of being finished right now. In an attempt to be a little more autobiographical (I'm never good with "writing" things down in my art journal, which is why I let my imagery speak for me.) So, I decided to make the writing more like a short but cryptic snippets of the thoughts in my head at any given time. I should warn you that sarcasm is a huge part of my internal monologue. Oh wait, you'll figure that out for yourself, real quick. Never-you-mind.

(Other pages in this journal)





1. 07_31_10, 2. 07_30_10, 3. 07_28_10, 4. 07_29_10