Between My Journal and the next

As I was organizing my supply cabinet, I ame across some little boxes; several papier mache and one of wood. I decided to collage some of these. The wood box was a challenge because it had a domed lid of raised planks, sort of like a pirate chest. I found a picture to fit it and glued and cut along each plank so that the picture was in strips.



The paper box is a hexagon. I used a clip-art page from a Somerset Studio magazine and little bits - buttons, a rusty tin heart, a "love" postage stamp, a piece of tulle. I glazed it with pink pearlessence powder mixed into a gloss medium. On both boxes I used beads as feet.

The holidays came and went and I had itchy fingers! The next journal installment wouldn't be here until after Feb 6. I took a retreat/workshop on Artist's Journals during January that was a very enlightening and oddly spiritual experience. There were 5 other women besides myself. They were all so accomplished and intellectual that I ended the first day feeling very insignificant. One of them talked about owning the name "artist" which made me feel like a fraud. But I learned that part of being an artist is believing that you ARE one. After lunch the next day I was talking to one woman that I really admired and mentioned how intimidated I was feeling - and she said that I intimidated HER. In a strange way, that made me feel good about myself.

We did several memorable exercises. In one, we divided a circle into six pie wedges, labeling each wedge as a componant of a balanced life...physical, spiritual, work, play, friends & family, and romance & adventure. We put a dot in each to signify our satisfaction with that aspect of our lives...the closer to the outer edge, the more satisfaction. We did this on very big paper and wrote and illustrated each wedge. It is a great way to snapshot how you feel about your life and if you do it , say, once a year - its a good barometer.

In another exercise we drew a map of our artistic life - where it came from, where it is now, and where you want it to go. Mine became a tree with branches instead of a map - but it works the same way. It gave me insight into my growth in the arts and helped convince me that I AM an artist and have been for a very long time.

The final exercise of the weekend was to build a container that represents your artist self and record the process in our journals. I created a silk bag that spilled out ribbons with adjectives on them of qualities that I wanted in my life...creative, sensitive, insightful, genuine, vocal, thoughtful, brave, forward, empathetic.
I have a habit of journaling plans for projects and never following through on actually accomplishing them. It was very exciting to plan a project and have it come out just the way I envisioned it. I've used this method to plan journal pages and it is great to have a record of how the finished page came about. The bag is mounted on an armature and sits on the top of my loom to remind me every day of all that I can be.