January journal

My January journal had a makeover -  I was determined to use separated pieces of water colour paper to make up the journal. Alas I must confess that I realized that I had to bind it. (Looked into Coptic binding - amazing ) but decided I will try that at a later stage.
So I went to the shop and bought a journal.  Out the window went all the sentimental ideas of using my son's baby album cover as a part of the journal.
 I had to reinvent the wheel - none of the pages I made so far fitted the new journal. Had to cut and rethink the whole thing. Maybe the Coptic stitching was not such a far fetched idea...
Anyway, I finished the one part of the January entry - if you look at the page you will see that the dates only go halfway.  I intend to make another double spread to finish January off. Hopefully I can achieve this before the end if January......
My theme for the first part was RISK. I always wonder about the concept of risk taking and the philosophy underpinning this action. Most if us are happy to live our lives away from risk - content with the things that we know and the familiar tide of the everyday routine. Taking risks means one may fail. Having the courage to risk failure is what effects change.  But to step out of our comfort zone have benefits: It can boost your confidence  and develops character and courage, enhance creativity, and helps establish a sense of both limitations and possibilities.

“Risk-taking is inherently failure-prone. Otherwise, it would be called sure-thing-taking.”

— Tim McMahon

So 2013 is the year of taking risks.  No bungy jumping or risky behaviour but hopefully stepping out to embrace  my creativity and the angst that it can bring. 

But back to the journal. Here is the double page for half of January.... Hope you like it.  I looked into all the wise sayings about risk taking out there and added some quotes to the page to express my feelings about the concept of risk. 

Art Journal 2013

I have taken the BIG step. Art journal 2013 has seen the light. After contemplating making an Art journal for ages, I have decided this time it is going to happen. This decision plunged me immediately into a creative crisis. After looking at many art journals, I felt that my style was not really represented and I was not prepared to "copy" other artists. So what to do.... Or not to do....
I was amazed to see the beautiful work of other artists as I googled away. All these examples of fab artwork in the form of journals can only inspire me to produce something that was going to be me. I don't really like the scrapbooking style, as I want to draw images myself and not want to copy or print images.
I also discovered Pinterest - what an eye opener. If you are reading this and don't know anything about Pinterest, look it up right now and start following..... Really amazing that you can find similar pages all pinned together. So download it (it's free) and start pinning.

The last two weeks haves been unbearably hot and I have moved out of the house onto the veranda with all my art stuff. I can now take a dip in to pool ( which I do several time a day) and go straight back to doing art in dripping togs... And the dogs are happy because they can find the breezy spots while still being close to me.

So back to the journal - I have done the front page yesterday. I decided that I wanted to make a book or rather a collection of pages instead of using a normal art journal or exercise book. So I had to find a cover for the front and back ( I wanted something thicker than the pages - watercolour paper - that I was going to use for the journal). Over the weekend I was looking at the photo album of our eldest son, Gian, now 23 and realized that the cover of the album was in a rather poor condition ( remember it lasted 23 years). I took all the photographs out to put into a new album and threw out the old album.
As I was pondering the start of the journal on Monday, I suddenly remember the photo album  - at this stage is was in the trash..... I retrieved it, cut the spine off and had two perfect hard covers for the prospective art journal. I think it is rather fitting that I use his album as it will give the project sentimental value. So armed with glue paper and pencils, I made the front cover of the journal.
Here it is......

Front cover of the Art Journal

I have also decided to divided the journal into monthly pages. Double spread for each month, divided into days. Big plans!!

With my holiday soon to come to an end and the prospect of going back to work is pushing me along to get the project to a point where I can draw / comment / doodle on a regular basis, at least. Regular basis is the operative word here..... I would like to do something each day but I know that it would be impossible once I'm back at school. So instead of punishing myself, I hope to do a drawing once week, but to make at least a comment every day.

So that is it.... The challenge is set! 352 days to go.
Today I have made the inside page of the cover. I had really fun doing it and think that it represents me. I had an old art book on the shelf and I took the introduction page out and started working on it. I looked for possible words that I can use and blocked the rest out. This is the result.

First page

The next step will be dividing the pages into months and the months into days.....
And then I am set and ready to go. Keep watching this space.
Peace

Doodles G and T for my two sons

I have now completed the hand prints for my two sons and husband.  I had been fun doing it as I added more personal messages and symbols for each into each drawing.  I treasure the time (especially very early in the morning) when I can sit down and draw without any distraction.  Genie and Cassie (my two dogs) and the budgies(Lexie and Lana) are the ones that keeping my company while the rest of the family is still asleep.  The coolness of the early mornings are also good for the old head... Here are the results:

Thymon's hand

Gian's hand

Giart's hand

All three hands

I probably have to start on my hand as well to complete the set.

In between working on the hand print I have started a random doodle - When I get bored or cannot think of anything creative I usually leave whatever I am busy doing and start something new. I reckon this is the time when my brain goes into idle. Anyway this is it - I am far from finished - will keep it as the in between project.  Have a lovely day.