Tag Archives: art journaling

Do What You LOVE!

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Hi everyone, I was really hanging out to get into the paints today. Its been a couple of days and I really noticed it. I decided to try painting  and drawing the face on fabric and seeing if I felt more comfortable with that. I did, actually I really enjoyed creating this page. I called it “Do what you love”. I am a real believer that life is too short to be stuck doing something you don’t love, even if it means you will have to be short of money.

I managed to get my studio tidy and then I was just itching to get going. I have some macros of this page so you can see closer up. Enjoy!

Are you doing what you love yet?????? If you have any art journal pages or mixed media art you would like to share, just add them at the bottom of this page.

Art Journal Pages

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Today I have been fixing my art journal pages together so that eventually they will be put into covers and become a journal again. I didn’t like the back of them being plain and I didn’t want to paint them as I was afraid they would effect the other side. I am not very happy with  my lack of “daily” journaling. However the days since I have been back in New Zealand have been really busy, so I have been doing the best I can. I have come to the conclusion that if I can do a few pages one day then that will make up for my lack of daily work. The picture above is today’s creation. I am enjoying the 3D effect the scrap paper pieces give the page.

This page I called “dream” and it was finished yesterday. As we go down the page you will see some of the first pages I finished and I am not too happy with them for different reasons. However, I need to keep them so I can see the progress:-) ( I hope!) I am working to try to end up with a journaling style that is uniquely mine and I expect that will take a while yet. Right now I still see a little Dina Wakely and Roben Smith in them but that will change as I practice adding in my own unique style.

The pages I am showing you, I have made since I decided to use bigger pages and  use them as loose pages. Before that I always used a much smaller journaling book. I do love the bigger format and I also love not having the pages attached as I can turn them around and have more freedom with them. The next two pages I am not keen on but will show them anyway:-)

Was not happy with all the different colors in this page and the white.

I think this page is far too busy and has too much going on.OK that’s it for today. If you would like to sent me some pics of your journaling pages I would LOVe to see them. MY new email addy and the only one that works right now is di54412 at gmail dot com or I would love you to tell me about your journey with art journaling.

Cya, Di

 

Butterfly and Whiteout Art Journal pages

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Here I am again, with really paint covered hands :-) The first one I have called Butterflies.how original …NOT! I used to use bright colors all the time in my dolls and other work. However , now my taste has changed. I like more subtle colors. You could’nt tell by these pages though:-) I think I really will enjoy the new paint colors.

Here’s a close up

The second page is next. I had nearly finished it when I decided I didn’t like it………….so I covered it with scrap paper and started again. I like the white space ..however there is this need to want to do more to the page until it is ruined …………..so I stopped !!

I like the new paper size and I love the new watercolor paper.  Any questions for me?????

 

All the best Di

 

Daily Art JOurnal page

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Today has been an interesting one for me with my journaling. I think the most important thing is that I made some new realizations. I now understand that the page size I have been using is too small for me! I also now know that I need to buy good watercolor paper.

The journal page shown is painted on a SMALL watercolor page and I just wasn’t happy with it at all. However I did say that I was going to do journaling daily so here it is.:-)

Tomorrow I am going out and will buy the exact journal that I want. I have a list LOL…so I have a few other art things to find too. I love to use items I already have around the house, however, this will not work for paper.

Art Journaling: Finding my own unique style

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Scroll down for a FREE online class and a video preview

More about finding your own style. I have decided to try to create a page a day and show them here on my blog. I feel that if I commit to trying new things and finding out what I love and what I don’t then I will eventually end up with my own authentic style in journaling. I remember doing the same thing with my dolls. I think its soooo important!

So to start with today I have 2 pages. Neither of them make me that happy, but I think I have to accept that to begin with. I used pattern tissue for the background on the first page, then as I worked I felt it became more and more too busy.

Last night I made some journal stencils from card. I have recently bought some of the crafters workshop stencils, but only the more complicated ones. So, I really like the idea of being able to make my own. I bought some acetate and tried doing some complicated ones that way, but that is difficult! I will leave it to the machines. I will make some smaller ones too, seeing these work so well.

I also hate wasting the paint when I use stencils so have started putting the excess paint onto tags that I can use later in other art.

This is the second journal page. Not thrilled with it either, but never mind , I will try again tomorrow.:-)

Here is a little bonus for you guys. A wonderful FREE online class with Traci Bautista. Heres a preview.

 

How do you find Your UNique Art Journaling Style?

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I have been pondering and obsessing over this question for quite a while now. About 8 years ago I created my first full journal. At that time I was working through some personal stuff ( marriage breakup after 30 years of marriage). It really helped me to clarify thoughts and feelings I was having. I got up each day cooked breakfast and while I was eating it, I journaled. I just flippped through magazines and ripped out any pictures that called to me and stuck them in the page and then I journaled. Here are a couple pages from that time.

Later on I started another book and basically did the same. However I have come to hate the shiny magazine pictures. I think that’s when I decided I will have to learn to draw. Not that I think I love the look of sketched pictures in journals much…..but just as a way of having not to use magazines. WEird!

Recently I reserved some books about drawing in a journal from the library. I got one by Dan price called “How to make a journal of your life”. The library charged me $5.10 for getting it from another library. I was happy with that, however this book is TINY! I really did not get much out of it. I also got “Everday Matters” by Danny Gregory. It really was not much better in turns of usefullness for me. I think Tracy Bunkers book “The art journal workshop was the most helpful. Funny that as I have not been that attracted to her art in the past, but for some reason after reading the book , it made me “let go” and not be so concerned about how my art looks.

I then did backgrounds in a journal, using paint and stencils and just really abstract art which I enjoyed . I found that it was hard to journal on those pages though. Then someone close to me came along and mentioned something about how they were not pretty. Then I went through the thoughts of: “did it have to be pretty to make me happy??” Is it anyone else’s business what my journal pages look like ???

Then I had lots of thoughts about ” did I really want to journal”….or was it that I just loved the rustic look of finished journals and just want to have a collection of them? Amazing how when you are pondering on something……..you find the information you need ( seemingly out of the blue).

Here is the blog post I found yesterday that really helped me. I hope it may help you too if you are looking to find your own style. The post is a guest post by Karen Grunberg on Julie Balzer blog.

My opinion is that her new finished journal pages still look like Dina Wakely‘s pages but theta may be because no one else seems to leave the white backgrounds on the pages, and of course she wont stop developing her journal pages as she goes along. But I do like how she suspended the  ( unwritten rules) in her head about how she needed to journal.

Here is a video of Roben- Marie Smiths journaling

I have now decided to also work on pages out of the journal itself and then glue them in later on. That way I can sew on them if I like and there seems more freedom to me to having a loose page to work on. The other thing I will be looking at is the size of the page, I may change to a larger page. I also want to use a technique that doesn’t make too much mess, that way I wont hesitate to get started in the mornings.

My goal is to have my art journaling as something I do automatically everyday, so I have a record of the day before…….the journal part only needs to be a paragragh. It seems important to me to actually record something about what I do each day, but because its not always something exciting, it doesn’t need to be long. The background will be important in that it has to be something I love and not look like anyone else’s journal pages.

Another thought I have been having is that most journaler’s have more than one journal going at a time. They may have one for doodling, one for journaling personal thoughts in and then others for lists or more arty work. Right now I choose to just have one as I want to have time in my day to make other art works as well.

I would love to hear from you as to how you found or are struggling to find your own art journaling style. Do you agree or disagree with me, that you need to find your own unique style?

 

Mixed media art and Journaling

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I have recently moved back to New Zealand from Australia where I have been living for many years now. Along with the change in country came some changes in direction. To make it even better its the “New Year”, a great time for new things. Happy New Year by the way:-)

As many of you will know, for years I designed and taught doll making. For the last few years I have focused more on Mixed media art including journaling. I think one of the reasons I love journaling so much is that it is portable, it is small in size and you just need a small amount of desk space, not an entire studio. The last place I lived was a 2 bedroom apartment and there really was very little space to do art work. Now I am living in a 3 bedroom old and roomy house and have art space at last woohoo!!!

We are redecorating the house room by room and this one needs a lot of work. And I am a messy creator, however I am showing you pics anyway, just to give you an idea of the space I have now.

I ended up buying a couple small bookcases from Warehouse which sit on the table and this way I can see my paints, sprays, mediums etc all out in front of me. Otherwise I find I have bought good stuff but never remember to use it.

One of the important things that this blog will focus on is being authentic in your journaling and in your artwork in general. What I mean by that is, do you take a class and find that afterwards your work looks like the teachers work? Or do you try to always make your artwork as authentic to your unique self as possible.?? I have seen many journals that I can immediately identify as a close copy of another artist..for instance Teesha Moore or Dina Wakely. Is that OK with you? Or would you love your work to be truly unique and only go to classes to learn the techniques.

How do you get your art to become unique??? How do these people who are amazingly different get noticed? Is it because they are different. One example of this would be Jesse Reno Have you seen his work on you tube?? Check out the video I have provided here.

 

Until Telstra Clear gets my broadband connected I am using a T stick and its taking ages to get these pics up.I will try again and let you go to the links and think about the questions I asked. I will be back tomorrow with more.

Would love to hear of any comments you have.

luv Di