Sketchbooks, "legacy" projects, and visual journalling have somehow figured in many of my conversations over the last week or so. Funny how ideas connect, collide, and enhance each other in unpredictable ways!I participated in a really wonderful and inspiring workshop on visual journalling with Judith Cassel-Mamet, sponsored by Abecedarian Gallery, over the weekend. I loved Judith's premise that a visual journal needn't be linear. The idea of working a bit on many pages simultaneously, back and forth, in the spaces (intervals) between things, in small moments, really resonated with me. Not surprisingly, working in a layered and additive manner appeals to me as a collagist.
It was great fun to work rapidly and freely with mixed media approaches to the pages. I have lots of wild new thoughts about journalling and artist book possibilities.I've decided to try integrating my art idea sketchbook (existing) into an idea/visual/fun/life journal. It's all intertwined anyway. However, my junk mail journal, which has been rather dormant of late, will remain its own entity... as it has a long, storied, and independent history!Hopefully I'll have pages from the sketch-journal (or whatever I eventually decide to call it!) to post here from time to time. The experimental piece shown is a cropped portion of a multi-layered mixed media piece that I worked on during the workshop, then simply taped into my book, to await further play (or not). We'll see... happily, anything goes.
Abecedarian Gallery
Imagination Navigation online
From the Abecedarian blog, "Imagination Navigation takes its title from a monograph about and exhibition of Joseph Cornell’s work. It is a show of 22 works by United States and Canadian artists working in assemblage and collage. The works were selected by Denver artist and exhibitions preparator Dave Seiler. While far from definitive, the exhibition provides a good overview of current trends in small to medium scale mixed media artworks."
Abecedarian Gallery in Denver has posted the show catalog online (requires Flash). Aside from the fact that my name is spelled wrong in the catalog/blog, I'm extremely pleased to be included in this one — featuring some really interesting and tactile responses to the concept of navigation. Worth a look!