Friday, September 7, 2007

Journaling on the theme

Another question: Do you all keep journals or use sketchbooks in developing your art work?

Taken as I am with the work of Linda and Laura Kemshall, I have been studying their website lately and looking closely at how they use their journals to develop art ideas. I've never been organized about my sketchbooks...they really tend to be a collection of scribbles, which sometimes prove useful in working out ideas.

I was thinking that for our challenges, I'd try to start a journal to work with the selected themes and see how (if?) it helps me as my thoughts devleop and images evolve.

Anyone else interested in doing that?

I figured that for those of us who are interested in giving that a try, we could post that here, too.

What do you think?

6 comments:

Kristin L said...

I keep a sketchbook, but it is ugly and practical -- not beautiful and inspiring like so many artists make these days. If I spent enough time on my sketchbook making it gorgeous then I'd have no time to make any other art. I do go back and reference my sketchbook quite often, so even if it's not pretty, it does have an important purpose. Of course, my blog is a lot like my sketchbook too -- I keep a lot of my journal-like thoughts there, as well as pictures of my projects.

Terri Stegmiller said...

I like the "keeping a sketchbook/journal" idea for these challenges. I may try this out..I even have a brand new, fresh, clean book to start with.

Gerrie said...

I'm with Kristin. I don't really write down much. I rarely make sketches. I work intuitively from what enters my brain. My blog has been a wonderful way for me to chronicle things because I am not a diar-ist or journal-ist. And I don't think I want to be one.

My first quilt is already in my brain. I have taken some photos of dandelions. When all my other commitments are finished, I will put this into fabric. So there you go. Maybe my comments and postings here will be my journal!!

Unknown said...

I keep a word 'life'journal but have been neglecting it since I started spending more time on quilting amd less on writing. OK ALL my time of quilting! When I started quilting I started a seperate set of journals (a good excuse to buy nice notebooks!) because I saw a definate starting point and an opportunity to record right from the beginning. However, it is not that visual really. I record my spending (scary!) and acqusitions of books, use it for those scribbled calculations of how much border fabric to buy etc. and a record of what I started and when I finished it. I do stick in inspirational pictures from time to time and may do a line sketch of a quilt plan. But I am not an artists and haven't really been bothered with making little water colurs sketches and all that. I do record ideas but again they tend to be verbal like you Diane - a lits of associations or of techniques I want to use. For example my last recorded inspiration was to write down all the words of Under African Skies by Paul Simon - I, however, know what that quilt might look like in my head!

However part of the C&G is pushing me towards journals that are more visual and I had already considered using these projects as a reason to have a go in a seperate notebook. So I am game to do it with you. the just might look a bit erm - verbal if I post them!!!

Deborah Boschert said...

Oh I just love "Under African Skies."

I have sketch books and I find I use them most often when I've started a piece of art and don't know where to go next. I draw out the basic composition and then test out different elements in the sketch book. I also makes lots of lists -- like the elements I want to incorporate in a piece and then I make arrows to show when they might go.

Terry Grant said...

Yeah, my sketches are for my own use and not really for public viewing. They would not mean much to anyone else I suspect. I started making some little sketches of the shapes of dandelion leaves, for example, then I scanned and traced them into Illustrator. There I can move them around and duplicate, etc. I do a lot of the "sketchbook" work in Illustrator these days.
I guess I could keep a "digital sketchbook." Hmmmm--never thought of it that way before.