Friday, January 3, 2014

fooled myself

Happy New Year! There is nothing like starting the new year with a realization that I have managed to fool myself yet again.. Natalya here and here's the story:

Back in 2007, inspired by Jeanne Williamson I started a weekly journaling project in which I explored different techniques, experimented with recycled materials and generally didn't give myself any rules except for size. I kept this going for two years and then got bored and decided to do a daily sketch journal. Sketching turned into experimenting with collage and painting and printing and doodling all on the pages of the said journal. Then in 2010 I got all fancy and did monthly diptychs based on my sketches from the year before. The following year I embarked on a very ambitious project of daily journaling on fabric. I had it all figured out: monthly prompts, experiments, binding into monthly books and then....I fizzled out and quit. Yup, quit. I thought that was the end of my journaling. Got it all out of my system, no need for more.

What I didn't even realize was that I hadn't really quit, I had just changed my media. You see, back in the beginning of  2009 I started something silly and frivolous on my blog called Wordless Wednesdays. It was really just blog fodder for when I couldn't think of anything else to blog about. I copied the idea from a bunch of other bloggers, sort of fell into a trend. Without even realizing it became a habit. Somewhere in 2012 the Wordless Wednesdays became more and more architecture based, only natural as my artwork was concentrating more and more on architecture. And they became not so wordless too somehow... In 2013 I gave myself a real challenge of making Wordless Wednesday an experiment in Photoshop using photos of NYC only.

So call me slow...but it was only this week as I planned out my Wordless Wednesday challenge for 2014 that I realized that I had never quit journaling! I just changed my journaling media... Isn't hindsight great?

So what's your journaling story? Weekly, monthly, everyday? Textile, paper or computer? And how has it morphed over time?

5 comments:

Carol Sloan said...

I love this post Natalya. I made a HUGE book a few years ago and put it on the shelf because
a. It was not my design so I felt it wasn't so much "mine, you know?
and
b. It was so big that I didn't want to carry it around.
But I looked at it and decided that since I made it I might as well use it. I started writing in it 2 years ago and am still writing in it. It's part journal, part sketchbook but more "mine" than any of my other books. It's more personal. Now when I want to just write, I grab it. I have grown to love writing in this huge book. Happy New Year!

Vicki Miller said...

Natalya, I keep sketchbooks and art journals as a matter of practice. They keep my ideas fresh for when I need them and give me something to work on when the muse isn't there. My rule is that there are no rules. As picasso said. Inspiration exists but it has to find you working. It doesn't matter what media, inspiration can cross the divide

Turtlemoonimpressions said...

Thanks for this inspiring post! I don't know if it'll get me journaling, but it's definitely going to motivate me to sketch more!

Pheasant Run Studio said...

As bloggers we should never have to apologize for wordless wednesday. It allows our readers to know that we are thinking of our blog everyday and we have so much to share there is always a fresh example of our work available.
I have been seriously journaling since 1998; sometimes in purchased books and sometimes in books I have made. I thought my journals were lame because the form is mostly "writing"; that's cursive writing. Now I learn that cursive will soon be obsolete, and my journals will be prime examples of a bygone era.

Natalya Khorover Aikens said...

Thanks for your comments everyone! Isn't it great that we're all so different?