What's new at The Loft - Episode 107

Art Journal Play

The New Year for me is about the renewal of a quest, the pursuit of a dream, and the beginning of new adventures and challenges.   Challenges can be inspirational, frustrating but also great motivators.  I had first hand experience with this when I did my ATC 365 challenge in 2010.  So aside from other projects I hope to get off the ground in 2012, I have also recently joined the Art Journal Everyday group hosted by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer of Balzer Designs.

I have been following Julie's blog for a few years now and she is always a great source of inspiration.  Her Art Journal Everyday group is what I call a great no pressure challenge.  All it requires (which is not really a requirement, more like a goal to strive for) is for you to work in your journal for 10 minutes everyday.  You don't have to complete a page everyday, it could be as simple as just laying down a background, but the hope is to have at least one page to post to Julie's site and the group Flickr pool once a week.  You can visit my flickr pool to see my entries this year so far.

So instead of sharing those entries I thought I would share some other art journal pages I have done in the past. 

 The way I work is to lay down a background or start a foundation for a page, but if I get stuck creatively or I'm not happy with the direction things are going I move on and come back to it later.  So it goes without saying that I tend to have some "works in progress" in my art journal which I have shared below.  

I'll post pictures of the completed pages another time.

Art journaling is a great way to experiment with new products and techniques and a fantastic creative outlet.  I have never been one to keep a "traditional" journal as I do not like recording my own personal thoughts, but with art journaling I've found I can share something of myself  in a different way.

If you are an art journaler drop me a line.  Comments are welcome, so don't be shy about telling me what you think.  Thanks for stopping by and come back soon.