Visual Journaling

I've been part of an Artist Trading Card group for a while now. I finally dove into this as I've wanted to make this mini pieces of artwork for a long time. In addition to this, some people from the group are doing "JAM Journals" where you prep your journal (or not) and then hand it off to someone else in the group to decorate a page, then it goes to someone else, and so on. In the midst of this, I found an online workshop series through Strathmore about visual journaling, featuring their new Visual Journals. The workshops have been really helpful in giving me ideas for this kind of journal.

I've always loved altered books and that kind of thing, but never knew where to start. All that white paper in a journal can be daunting. Then, how do you make space for writing if you've collaged things all over the place? Between the workshop and participating in the JAM Journal sessions with fellow ATC artists, I've come up with some suggestions/answers to that question. I plan to share these in this blog to offer a little sampling of ideas you might try if you're interested in a visual journal or a combination writing/art journal. I have two different ideas for this, so I will share pictures as I work through each. I, myself, will determine which format I think works best for me in the end, or for a particular purpose.

The theme of one of my journals will be a reflection on Pamela Bowles' documentary, "Who Does She Think She Is?" which is about contemporary women artists, the place of women in art history and what it means to be a woman, mother and artist. I plan to use one of my journals as a place to reflect upon my own female artist self, to examine those women who are working right alongside me today, and to honor those who have paved some of the way and whose work influences my life. This is the first one I'll prepare.

Strathmore Visual Journal with bristol paper
3.5" x 5" / 48 pages

For this journal, I'm starting with a small book, so it is easy to hold in my hands, and not daunting at all to approach. I decided to partition some pages to set up a flow. This is kind of an "artist's outline" if you want to look at it that way.

The top photo shows my notes to myself about themes and how I want to prep the cover of the journal. I plan to cover the chip board cover with decorative paper, and to use endpaper to "finish" the inside of the cover. Here, I will put contact information so that if I ever lose the book, hopefully someone will return it to me!

The second photo (in the middle) and the third photo (on the right) show the pages I've marked for altering. Since I plan to write in this journal, I want to leave some white space, or at least "space" even if I use papers to cover the page itself. What I did was count out a certain number of pages so that the embellishments and "art" I add are evenly spaced in the journal. This will help me plan so that there are not ten pages of artwork, five pages of all writing and then another few pages of a combination. The book will have a much more "put together" feel and yet will seem somewhat accidental in the way those kinds of altered/visual journals always appear when we see them done by others! 

With marked pages, if I want a color theme or other kind of theme, it can be found throughout the book, but in an organized fashion. It's like that mathematical concept of there being order in chaos. Looking at the pine tree outside my office window here, I see that the branches are not entirely symmetrical. However, they are evenly spaced around the tree, if not mirror image branches on every side. That's my idea of "order in chaos" today. Or, it's like the small dip bowl I keep filled with tiny pebbles from the beach. Sure, they vary in color and size and shape, even geological make-up. However, being contained in one place, they are organized randomness. 

As I create this journal, I'll add photos so that you may watch the process as it unfolds. This is learning I'm doing at the same time. It's not a tutorial, but rather an experiment I'm sharing as I move through each step. Feel free to join in, to post or email comments or share your own visual journal, artist journal or other journaling techniques.