Beginners guide to Art Journalism

Hi friends,

Today I am on the ITSYBITSY  blog as guest designer sharing my first page in my mixed media art 

journal.I was very excited when Itsybitsy sent over their newly launched mixed media journal and the

color splash sprays and grainy paste to me.I am a big fan of art journals and needless to say I was

over the moon to receive the goodies.My heartfelt thanks to Rashmi Harish for thinking of me and 

Anitha Mallesh for the prompt delivery.

First and foremost it is important to demystify the process of creating an art journal.Most of you 

would be thinking WHY and HOW and WHICH journal to use.

In simple terms  as to the WHY my answer is:

1 .I create a page in my journal to celebrate some important event in my life or just simply to 

document my life with the help of art

2. It gives us a small substrate to experiment with mediums and techniques which otherwise may

seem very daunting to you.

3. It helps as a therapy as you can use art as a way to express your emotions /insecurities/stress of 

daily life in a small page.This can be just for you and need not be made public.

4. It is great fun to fill the pages as you try new things.

5. It also acts as a reference point when you get stuck in your other projects and need some 

inspiration.

6 .It also helps me in developing my style of work and reflects my progression in my art journey.

I think they are enough reasons for anybody to take up art journalism.Now comes the HOW part.Just 

pick up a journal and begin with whatever materials you have in hand.Mediums like

acrylics,pastels,watercolor, gelatoes ,pastel crayons pencils,markers,gel pens all come in handy as    

 you explore the artist in you.There are no set rules and as one would write a diary ,you go about          

making art that you feel like doing.Now comes the WHICH part.It is quite a pleasure to introduce  

 the newly launched ART JOURNALS by ITSYBITSY. The mixed media one which I would be   

using has various different kinds of substrates to work on.It has kraft paper,corrugated paper,burlap    

 jute and handmadepaper which lets you experiment with different textures.The best part is that this  

journal is all ready to use.They come in two very functional sizes.

                                     ART JOURNAL PAGE:TRAVEL THEME

Now it is time to talk about the page I created in mix media  journal.As the months of May and June 

as vacation period for kids in north India ,most of us travel for recreation.Thus I choose to create my 

travel theme page reflecting my recent visit.Will try to explain some step s involved in making this 

page too.

The process:First gather all your supplies and think of any theme or objective/reason for creating a 

page.It can be very specific pertaining to your life or quite general like you are feeling happy so want 

to create or want to try some technique or medium.

.

As I discussed earlier I wanted to do something related to my recent travels so I picked up a picture

 which I printed on my inkjet printer in the appropriate size and one brochure given to us at the site.It

 is always a good idea to pick up some extra brochure which can be used as backgrounds.

 One more thing that you need to organise is undersheet which you place below your pages so the

 color does not seep in.Also I like to use baking sheets as inserts to my done pages so that they do do 

stick to each other.I randomly tore a picture from the brochure and pasted the same with decoupage 

glue on to the kraft sheet spread.As the color scheme was quite earthy I choose the Kraft sheet to 

work on.

 Next I took some white gesso and used color splash lemon zing to give it color and than 

randomly spread on the page with brush.

 Also used a stencil and modelling paste colored with color splash spray to give interest to the page.

 I also wanted to use one die cut on the page which again I colored with the spray(tangerine).The 

sprays are quite pigmented and give bright colors.

I than did some stamping with archival ink pad and colored my chipboard with black mont marte 

gesso.I stamped the destinations on watercolor paper and pasted all my various elements together 

.Finally I did some dry brushing of Tinted metallic twany glint on the chipboard and the 

textures.Hope you like the page and will be inspired to create your own.

List of products used from Itsybitsy:

Art Journal

Color splash tangerine

Color splash lemon zing

color splash mocha

Mont marte modelling paste

Thanks a bunch for being here and going through the post.Happy crafting.

Ruchi