making a new visual journal

I sent off 7 visual journals for some fun that Papaya has in store for them this year. This is their second independent journey this year. They like a fun excursion and all the attention they get being fondled and photographed. I however, am lonely without them...at least the blank pages in them. My fingers are itching to paint and doodle and draw and purge some minutia from my mind. Earlier this week I tried getting my fix on wood and canvas as you can see here:

Which helped for a bit, but then I ended up at Judy Wise's blog and couldn't stand being journal-less another minute. I like Judy's take on visual journaling, I feel like I really get a clear sense of her artistic voice. It seems to me that she paints and draws more than collages. I also love her method of dating her entries, with date stamp each time, and that she journals in order, page after page among other things.  Although I have always stressed that I don't do this, I'd like to try one journal where I do work in chronological order. Thankful to Judy for the inspiration to get back to playing in my visual journal with some new viewpoints, new things to incorporate, all why trying to clarify my voice and grow at the same time. So, of course, with my journals off on vacation, I had to make a new one.

I can't ever bear to throw away any of the expensive and delicious-to-play-with watercolor paper remnants left from other projects, so I sewed the scraps together to make up the big pieces I needed for the signatures. I also incorporated Teesha's method of folding the extra paper on the edge in, instead of tearing it off. Here is another page that is being re-purposed like the one above. I painted and collaged over the parts from it's previous incarnation, doodled and drew and used the existing paint mark as an outline for a face, not something I usually draw in my journals, but it just kept staring at me, so I went with it. (I'm assuming that might be a bit of Judy's influence too). Kinda doesn't look like me, but feels like fun exploration. It's good to push myself out of my comfort zone once in awhile. I think I'll like it a lot better when I write on it. And if not, it's ok to dislike some pages, or I can paint all over it again. Growth spurts can be awkward, right?

 

Here's the inside of the book before I sewed the pages in:

The signatures before sewing in (three signatures of 6). They aren't all painted on, just a few to get it started.

 

And the first pages, still in progress:

Ahhh, a new journal, that feels much better. Have a great weekend, you know mine will include some journaling.

Comments

[susan gilman]

oh yum...thank you for sharing! I so love your pages and your stories of how you get there always makes me want to RUSH OVER to my pages and try it!

[andrea]

How pretty!
I wish I could journal like you :)

[Prudence Rapozo]

This is beautiful. Pam you are an inspiration to me, I love your work!

[Linda]

Pam, this is so inspirational! I have yet to make an art journal, but you may have just pushed me over the edge...tempting:D

[cgs]

your work is just great.~cOnNie

[simona]

lovely!

[Lorelei]

I've wondered what you've been up to - and now I see. The beginning is beautiful - can't wait to see it in progress... Gorgeous!!

[Sherry Ball Schoenfeldt]

beautiful. and so different from how I do it - I bind my journals AFTER I finish the pages. I just bound one yesterday and think I'll go blog about it now.
thanks for sharing so much with all of us ~ Sherry