Art Journal Party At Dirty Footprints Studio

Connie over at Dirty Footprints Studio is wrapping up her 30 Journals 30 Days by opening up the fun to everyone. She's asked everyone to answer a few questions about their art journaling and to post a link at her website. Go check it out and be inspired and awed at the amazing art journal love she has cookin' up over there! It's a truly uplifting and supportive community she has created.

So, here's my "interview."

How long have you been Art Journaling?

I'm not sure what I do qualifies as art journaling but my introduction to art journaling has been the jumping off place for what I do. My stuff is really more like - decorated morning pages. I am still much more verbally than visually oriented. Still, it was a revelation to me when about a year ago I was introduced to art journaling and felt compelled to put color on the page. I am hoping that as time goes on I will begin to feel even more comfortable expressing myself visually but for now this is where I am.

How has Art Journaling impacted, changed or enhanced your life?

It's allowed me to express myself in ways I didn't know I had in me. It has opened me up to color, shape, line - I didn't know I thought that way. It also never ceases to amaze me how it reveals something I need to know. I'll think I'm picking eggs to put in my art journal just because I am aesthetically drawn to them and then suddenly I'll find myself writing about what I'm trying to "hatch." It's also allowed me to fully embrace my imperfection. I'm NOT a visual artist - much of what I do is rudimentary - but that's OK because my journal is for me, just for me. By being so deeply committed to something at which I'm not very good I've been open to accepting "failure" in other areas of my life. I'm much more able to learn from "mistakes" rather than cringing and curling up in a corner over my "failure."

What are some of your favorite Art Journaling materials to use?

CHEAP ACRYLIC PAINT!!! It's cheap so I don't feel the pressure to create something wonderful and I can use as much as I want. It's immediate color on the page. I also like markers, colored pens, baby wipes, scraps of paper and cut outs from old magazines. Oh, and gel medium - you can NEVER have enough of that stuff!

Who are some of your favorite Art Journalers?

I have to confess that I haven't started collecting names yet. I'm still easing my way into the community. I buy and am inspired by Art Journal Magazine but the names I know are Connie and, of course, Teesha Moore.

What words of encouragement would you say to an Art Journal newbie?

There are no rules. Have fun. Just start. If I can do it, you can do it. Don't be intimidated by other people's beautiful pages. Be inspired and seek to express yourself. You'll be surprised what you discover.

My bio?

Actress, voice teacher, jewelry designer, part time poet, full time mom. In my fantasy world I live by the ocean in a little house situated between a library and and art supply store

Giggle

Moving My Life into the Foreground

I'm participating in the Spill It Workshop led by the wonderful Carmen Torbus. Our first assignment was to create backgrounds for our pieces. I had a great time doing this, intuitively moving the paint around the canvas with my hands. I learned so much and it was very freeing. This week we're doing image transfers. I am SO STUCK!! I just can't seem to move onto this next step. I was looking through my journal to see if something would inspire me and then it hit me - I NEVER cover the backgrounds. Well, I do - I write over them but I never cover them with images. I never move beyond that first step. I have another project that I started - I did paper collage over some old hardback book covers. I want to add images and paint but they have just been sitting on my table staring at me for over a month now. I think I'm afraid I will mess things up. It's as if my inner critic is saying, "Phew, made it past that first step without making a total ass out of yourself - better quit now before something bad happens." What happened to all of that wrecking I did this summer. I'm invoking my Inner Wrecking Warrior - help me wreck this canvas!!! Help me move into the foreground!

Moving On

I'm over my art journal angst a bit now. Thanks to WTJ I know how to dry out a journal. For now I've decided to just plow forward. I thought about scrapping it and using it as fodder for future journals or putting it aside for now. However, I've decided to just embrace it the way it is and move ahead.

And speaking of journals, my journal workshop was interesting (as always) yesterday. A nice bunch of kids and even the older group (4th-8th grade) managed to find themselves "in the flow" several times. It's so gratifying to me to see a group of 22 kids silently engaged in their thoughts and creativity. I can almost hear them give a sigh of relief. For the most part, their worlds only allow them about three ways to "be" - locked into their left brains, acting out, or zoned out in front of some blinking screen. Once the door is open for them to cross over into their right brains they settle into it and you can even see their body posture change, the muscles in their faces relax.

A former student of mine who is now a student in the NYU film department was there with a friend doing a mini-documentary on the camp. Molly and her colleague both noticed the abrupt change in attitude that happens right around 4th grade. She said, "Wow, when you asked the younger kids who thought of themselves as a good drawer every hand in the place went up but when you asked the older kids - only one hand meekly went up." She mentioned that the younger kids were also so engrossed in the workshop right from the beginning they didn't even notice that they were being filmed & photographed but the older kids noticed right away.

Molly had some great questions for me, too. What did I hope the students would gain from this experience. I hope they come to claim a space for themselves - even if it is only an 8 1/2 by 11 sheet of paper. I hope they can carve out that little rectangle and say "Here it's OK to be me, to experiment, to create, to make mistakes, to laugh, to cry, to dream, to explore, to hope." And I hope that 8 1/2 x 11 rectangle grows to include the world.

Unplanned Wrecking

My "real" art journal was wrecked today and I am heart sick. I took it with me to show the kids in my journaling workshop. The funny thing is, I chose not to share it with them because I thought I should focus on them and not on myself. But, in the course of toting it from home to the theatre - tea spilled all over it. Inks ran, pages bled together, some are tea stained. Things are ruined, wrecked and all my work with Wreck This Journal hasn't made me feel much better. I know eventually I will have the choice to create something out of this "destruction" but at the moment I'm just feeling sad and angry. I guess this is one of the points of the WTJ exercise. At the terrible moment of destruction stands this choice, stay stuck in the sorrow or move forward to create.

Conjuring the Night

Upright

Suck up your feelings dearie and get on with things

Ghost

Empty

clarity

Fog

I've been feeling panicked and edgy and, ok, angry. It has seemed like I'm in a fog -not knowing for sure which direction I'm going. And, when you're in the fog, it's probably best to just stop until you gain clarity. At first I was pretty pissed off about the fog forcing me to stop. But, as I examined the fog I started to remember all the old fairy tales and how the fog or mist surrounded a place of great knowing. You just have to find your way through the fog. That's given me hope. Perhaps somewhere in the fog of my life there is a tiny beam of light leading me to a place of greater wisdom and understanding. So, I'm going to try to summon what little patience I have, still myself and look deep into the fog for whatever answers and light might be there.

Darkness

January 14, 2008

It's been quite a while since I've been here. I've been busy with rehearsals trying to apply my new attitude. Today it was hard because we were dancing. In the past, I've tended to constrict - close myself off with thoughts regarding my inadequacy as a dancer. As if my lack of skill isn't enough, I feel I must keep reiterating the point verbally "I'M NOT A DANCER!!" I've been on the receiving end of this kind of mind set and I know how exasperating it is. I always want to say, "Just shut-up and DO IT!! Stop making excuses. You're just wasting time. " So, I said it to myself and tried to keep the demon voices at bay. It worked. I had fun and I caught on much more quickly than I have in the past.



I have two pages gessoed in my art journals but my body is tired. I don't know when I'll get to them. I've been coloring mandalas to stay visually stimulated and spiritually centered. I find mandalas very soothing and I frequently get great ideas about poems, acting choices or even what to make for dinner while I'm coloring. I own several books but I also found a great site that has lots of free mandalas to color. http://www.coloringcastle.com/mandala_coloring_pages.html

DREAM