Over the weekend I took part in a Creative Hour conversation with Caylee Grey, Meg of Meg Journals, Claudette Hasenjager and more than 100 other art journalers. Caylee is the founder of Get Messy, and Claudette, Meg, and I are three of thirty artists leading this year’s Messy May, a free daily art journaling project.
Connecting with other creatives is something I treasure. Sharing processes, challenges, inspiration, and habits reminds me both of how deeply personal creating necessarily is, and also how universal and innately human creativity is. I am always humbled and inspired, and leave more curious about and committed to my creative practice.
Thank you to all the participants for joining, and to Claudette, Meg, and Caylee for a fantastic conversation.
PLAY in Messy May
For me, creating is a practice of tapping into childlike wonder and intuition. There is no room in my art journal for criticism or perfectionism — only curiosity, joyful exploration, and reflection. As a Messy May featured artist, I encouraged participants to let go of expectations and tap into playfulness and possibility.
Check out the video above for a time lapse of my process, and some additional creative prompts to encourage playfulness.
And below, just a few of the many, many responses to the PLAY prompt. Click on any image to be taken to the artist’s feed. (If you decide to give it a go, please tag me on Instagram! I’d love to see what you make.)
I have heard from a number of people over the course of my own creative journey who’ve said something along the lines of “I’m not an artist, but I’m interested in starting an art journal [or painting, or exploring collage]. Where do I begin?”
First up: yeah, actually, you are an artist.
Creating is innate; as a species, we’ve been expressing ourselves through dance, sculpture, music and painting for tens of thousands of years. You don’t need a degree to make art, and you don’t need to make “good” art to be an artist. All you need to do is start.
I wrote on My Peacetree — way back in 2011 — about the creative process:
The journey to creativity is not a static one: we must always be searching, pushing, moving, and striving forward. There is no end to be reached — there is only new discovery, exploration, growth, stretching, and learning […]
Art is something which must be practiced over and over again. It is only through this we can really make it our own.
As to where to start: What art makes you pause and stare? Go buy some of those materials — cheap ones are fine. Try them out. Make mistakes. Experiment.
Seek out other artists, look closely at their work, and pull elements of it that you love into your own. (Don’t steal others’ work, though! Incorporating colors and processes and materials is ok; duplicating work is not. And always, always credit artists where it’s due.)
What do you like about your art? Do more of that. What don’t you like about your work? Do less of that.
And above all else, don’t apologize for your work or for yourself. Take yourself seriously and others will, too.
Last year, in late January, I got married. This year, I spent the day alone.
We’d been working on getting a visa for months, bogged down by bureaucracy, unexpected challenges, and moving goal posts. The embassy took my passport in September, and by January, the uncertainty of when I would be able to travel out of the country again was unbearable.
While in agonizing limbo, my friend re-shared Oh, the Places You’ll Go! by Dr. Seuss. I thought I knew it pretty well: it’s a celebratory gift to many graduates, lauding all the adventures they’ll have and the wide horizons of endless possibility.
I’d forgotten, though, about The Waiting Place.
The Waiting Place…
…for people just waiting. Waiting for a train to go or a bus to come, or a plane to go or the mail to come, or the rain to go or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow or the waiting around for a Yes or No or waiting for their hair to grow. Everyone is just waiting.
Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for the wind to fly a kite or waiting around for Friday night or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil, or a Better Break or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants or a wig with curls, or Another Chance. Everyone is just waiting.
Somewhere in my personal waiting place, I came across a crucial reminder that, no matter how dark or difficult or heartbreaking or lonely this moment is, humans across the globe — throughout all of time — have been through it, too, and there is a piece of poetry or art or music that echoes that pain.
No matter how isolated or powerless you may feel, you are not alone. And, because life is the way it is and change is inevitable, these valleys will not last forever.
Somehow you’ll escape all that waiting and staying You’ll find the bright places where Boom Bands are playing.
Somehow, we did escape all that waiting. I am writing from Germany — the visa was approved just a little over a week ago. I picked it up the morning of our anniversary.
Somehow I’ve made it this many years before ever hearing about commonplace books. You, too?
Commonplace books seem to be, generally, a written collection of the things that attract your attention and pique your interest — a more right-brained version of an art journal, I suppose. The actual definition is broad.
Commonplace books are accessible
Wikipedia explains commonplace books as “a way to compile knowledge, usually by writing information into books.” Kevin Egan describes them as being “like a ‘thinker’s journal’ that serves as a focused act of self-reflection and way to learn;” Ryan Holiday similarly calls them a “central resource or depository for ideas, quotes, anecdotes, observations and information you come across during your life and didactic pursuits.”
MasterClass, by contract, emphasizes that a commonplace book (they call it a commonplace diary) is not just a place to write all these tidbits down, but also a system for keeping track of the information you gather. Some people use index cards or a table of contents, or color code their entries. This is where my eyes glaze over, but it’s well worth reading about if that’s something you’re interested in.
What surprised me is that commonplace books have been kept for centuries, by both ordinary folks and historical geniuses. Marcus Aurelius kept a commonplace book, as did Virginia Woolf. Austin Kleon is keeping one that’s just quotes. I imagine that many of the diaries shared by Papers of the Past could be considered commonplace books, too.
There are no rules
That commonplace books aren’t a single definitive thing makes me all the more interested in keeping one. The idea of a daily journal intimidates me: I get caught up in the idea of what a journal “should” be — namely that I “have” to write proper entries, dated in order, while recounting my life and my feelings about my life. (My logbook has been the best and most sustainable way for me to record my day-to-day life: I’ve kept it up for over two years now.)
But writing down a sentence here and an idea there as I discover new things, mixed in with occasional personal reflections, seems just right, and is a much more apt representation of how my brain works.
Capture what you’re already paying attention to
Since discovering the idea of commonplace books — it was on September 6, and I know because I wrote an entry about it — I’ve jotted down a bunch of random and interesting things, including thoughts on value and productivity, deep work and flow, procrastination, and writing.
While it might sound lofty, all the excerpts I’ve written have been from tweets, newsletters, Reddit, TV shows, and other sources I was already visiting, reading, or watching. The difference is that now I have a record of things that inspired me. Now, I can go back and find connections, go back to the sources, get reinspired, and actually remember what it is that I’m interested in and what I like thinking about.
I’ll leave you with a song lyric that I pulled today that made me laugh (here’s the song):
Art journaling is, at its simplest, creating visual art in a book. Also called an artist sketchbook, visual diary, or art diary, art journals have been used by artists for centuries for a variety of purposes. Leonardo da Vinci, Joan Mitchell, and Frida Kahlo all kept visual diaries over the course of their lives.
I’ve been working as an art journaler since 2009 after finding iHanna’s beautiful and inspirational blog. Over the course of the years, I’ve experimented with a range of book sizes, mediums, and processes.
But art journaling is accessible, easy — there are, really, no rules — and anyone can do it. All you need to do is choose a book, get inspired, and make some art.
Choose a book
There are so many options when choosing what to use as your art journal: teeny books, big books, different page thicknesses, colored pages, books with different bindings, etc. You may go through several types of book before finding the one that works best for you.
I use (currently, anyway) books that I’ve handbound with watercolor paper. My last few art journals have been about 5×7 inches (about 13×18 cm), which I’ve really loved. I also really enjoy working in thrifted books: you aren’t starting with a blank page, and any pages that you tear out can then be used as collage material.
Anything that sparks your interest will do: spiral-bound journals, notebooks made for multi-media, composition notebooks, thrifted books, and so on. You could also use loose-leaf pages and sew or staple them together later. Depending on quality of the paper, you may want to glue several pages together (say, three pages at a time throughout the book) to create a sturdier surface for your media.
Whatever you choose, I’d suggest starting out with books with fewer pages at first: you’ll be able to test out how the paper takes your medium without a lot of pressure. You may get discouraged if you have another 300 pages to fill of a book that isn’t working for you.
Get Inspired
Find and follow artists whose work you like — the #artjournal and #artjournaling hashtags on Instagram are a great way to look through lots of different kinds of books and discover new artists that you otherwise might not come across.
Check out books about art journaling. The 1000 Artist Journal Pages (please find it at your library or buy from your local indie book store if you can!) in particular is a huge compilation of artist pages with a variety of styles. Stampington’s Art Journal Magazine is also a great resource.
Go to your local art store, dollar store, or craft store and see what supplies pique your interest. I’ve used a range of cheap and unusual supplies in my art journals, including sticky notes, highlighters, staples, ballpoint pens, and crayons. Thrift stores also have a ton of used books and magazines that are great for collage. Art journaling doesn’t have to be expensive!
Make some art
There are no rules about what you add to your book: there is no one way to art journal. But it can be intimidating to start, so here’s a list of materials you could experiment with:
Collage materials: lined or graph paper, thrifted book pages, maps or pages from an atlas, tissue paper, security envelopes, images cut out of magazines, photographs, found lists, ticket stubs, cards, wrapping paper, newspaper, etc.
Paint: acrylic paint, tempera paint sticks, watercolor, gouache, India ink. You can use water to thin or mix colors, or lay it on thick, or let it drip or splash on the pages.
Glue: matte medium, gel medium, a glue stick, hot glue, rubber cement, tape, glue dots — experiment and see what you like working with best! Keep in mind that some adhesives will hold up better than others in the long term, and only some are archival (ie., will not yellow over time). Be sure to read the label to see what each product offers.
Other mark-making tools: oil or chalk pastels, water-based markers, paint markers, charcoal, ballpoint pen, colored pencil, graphite, stamps, crayon, etc.
My favorite mixed media tools right now are book pages, acrylic ink, oil pastel, and pencils.
The biggest takeaway
But above all, the most important piece about art journaling is have fun. Create for yourself — there’s no need to share with others (in person or online) if you don’t want to. Your art is for YOU. Make mistakes. Be messy. Make ugly art. Enjoy the process!
And if you have any questions about art journaling, need some encouragement, or want to share what you’re working on, I’d love to hear from you.
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