Valentines Day Love....

...Art Journal Love!

February the 14th... 45th day of the year... commemoration of Saint Valentine... celebration of love and affection... and Art Journal Love Day at the Dirty Footprints Studio!

This morning dawned bright and clear and the valentine fairy had been... leaving me a lovely card and chocolates (before he left for work!) on the kitchen countertop for me to find... and so the day started well, in fact it put me in the mood for a spot of Art Journal Love!

Opening the blinds wide to let the sun stream in and grabbing my Moleskine journal, I set to work! I gesso'd over an old page and used Caran d'Ache Neocolor II watersoluble wax pastels to create a bright background...

... and if you want to see the page being made, well here ya go!

If you want to see some more Art Journal Love... then pop over to Dirty Footprints Studio where Connie is hosting a party!

Share the love!

Archives... unearthed!

Way back in 2008, when I first started interacting with other art journalers and artists on the internet, I made some short videos of me just playing around in my art journals. They weren't big or clever and they certainly didn't teach anyone anything... but as I liked watching other people's art journaling videos on youtube etc, I thought it might be nice to share too.

However back then my confidence was at zero; having been told I couldn't play with the 'big girls' and harking back to my own insecurities about not being able to draw (ok I can draw but not like a master!) and the constant feeling that art was for "the professionals"... I left the videos lanquishing on a memory card...somewhere.

Then in the new year I connected with some lovely ladies on Ustream and they let me watch and chat as they made their art and they made me remember those videos sitting and gathering virtual dust... so I decided to share too.

It's funny when I look back at those videos of myself, as you evolve so much; things I did then but wouldn't do now, the way I did things then and don't do now... its interesting to see me back then on a different time in my journey.

Here are the videos if you are interested... I have more to look through and rediscover, some are just fragments of pages in progress and some will remain lanquishing on those memory cards... but either way they were all part of my art journey.

Art Journal: Butterfly

Art Journal: Love You

Art Journal: Take Time

Art Heals... I Swear

I've been ill for so long, in fact I'm sick of being sick, if that makes sense. Being ill is hard, it takes away your focus and purpose. The working man or woman may think that it could be great fun being at home all the time, watching TV, reading, surfing the net... but in reality when you are ill you have no focus.

You watch TV, but don't really remember what you watched as halfway through the programme you were in pain and it made you miss what was said for 5 minutes, or your drugs made you sleepy and, "you know...I'm sure I nodded off for a few minutes then".

But the worst of being ill, is not knowing one day to the next how you will feel, not being able to plan your life, not even the minutiae. You may have 2 great days, so you think "tomorrow I will clear out that cupboard" you don't even realise that you are feeling a little better, you just have the energy to focus on something and... strangely... you are looking forward to clearing out that cupboard. You can't remember what's actually in the cupboard, there may be new shoes, new art supplies, an unread book... and so clearing out that cupboard has become "something to look forward too".

Then tomorrow dawns bright and clear... and you feel crap. You can hardly get out of bed, your head is pounding, you feel sick and you think to yourself, "but I was going to clear out that cupboard today..." and you realise that you don't feel well enough... not even well enough to clear out a cupboard.

I guess that's about when I discovered the healing nature of art. If I am in pain, I find relief in focusing on scrawling in my art journal. It doesn't have to be artistic, it doesn't have to be a fabulous work... just splotching paint or ink or watercolour pencils or wax pastels takes me to a different place... and suddenly two hours have gone past.

Since I added art to my life, things have definitely got better for me. I have started to *enjoy* more, I have started to relax more, I enjoy letting go and making art heals me... I swear.

Virtual Journaling?

I've been a journal keeper for such a long time, one-line diaries when I was small, 'a week to two pages' as I got older, and a 'page a day' during my working career. I've had Filofaxes in all sizes, from the smallest handbag size (is it called the Micro?) through to the huge desktop A4 size. Every one of these diaries has a snippet of my life inside it and they are all stored up in the attic...somewhere.

In recent years I've moved onto journals, there's more freedom in a blank page than there is on a lined one that has today's date at the top. I guess over the last few years my journals have morphed from daily records, into travel journals and now more so into Art Journals. I love the freedom, the freeform, of Art Journaling. I don't just have to use words, I don't just have to use pictures, I don't have to write, I don't have to draw, I can stick 'that' in becase I like it.... I guess that's why I like Art Journaling so much.

But just like my diaries, my Art Journals are pieces of me - snippets of my life are kept inside... so I find it odd this new fad of recording your life on a weblog, of 'sharing' your soul, sharing your art, sharing your life with the entire internet viewing world... and have thus bucked the trend for so very long. But my friends are persistent, they tell me they love my journals, they want to see more entries, that I should "upload" them.

And then as I surf around the net, I find so many other AJ'ers sharing their work, sharing their knowledge, being lighthearted and open... and I know it's time.