Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Art Journaling

when suffering from creative BLOCK, and we all do from time to time. What do you do? Or, more importantly what do I do? Last month I joined an art journaling club that meets the second Sunday afternoon every month. It was great fun and I met some new artist friends and was surprised to see some familiar faces from The Continuum group. The facilitator for the Continuum is Laura Thoma and she happens to lead this group as well.  All I needed to do was show up with a journal and my $10. She provides everything we need to work on the project that day !!  When she assigned homework I dutifully entered it in my little book and totally forgot about it until today.

The one of 4 suggested homework tasks I began today, is choosing 8-10 people that inspire me creatively.  Easy, peasy, right? Not so easy. Three come to mind right off, Georgia O’Keefe, Louise Nevelson, and Dale Chihuly. Then who? OK, Kurt Schwitters, I told you readers about him last week sometime after I watched the video.  That’s 4. OK, I got another one, glass artist Laura Donefer and Collage/assemblage artist Dale Copeland, that makes 6. Next, these two incredible colorists: Jane Dunnewold and  Mickey Lawler, both whose current concentrations are surface design for art cloth and art quilts, respectively. My own art quilt journey was first inspired by Melody Johnson, one of the co-founders of a Midwest group made up of members who are or want to be Professional Art Quilters. That group has since morphed into a much broader interpretation of the members artistic focus. The monthly meeting show and tell is an inspiration all by itself.

Whew, that was way easier than I thought it would be. Sometimes it’s good to just sit down and do it and write what comes as quickly as it bubbles to the surface.  There are way more people that I could list here, but that would become a list that could on and on for days.  Well enjoy these fabulous artists websites and I’ll let you know what Laura has us do with our list. The next session is this Sunday, Feb.14th, 1-3 PM, at the Blick Art Supplies, Danada Square, in Wheaton, IL. Grab a blank journal and come join us.

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