Art Journal Tutorials

WHY ART JOURNAL?

I fell hard for art journaling as soon as found it. Creativity was always important to me. I liked to write and sew, to make things with my hands, and I love to play with new ideas. But I was brand new to the visual arts. When I found art journaling a decade or so ago, I could see that I was entering into a conversation with my creative self—and I knew that I wanted to see where that conversation would take me. And all I can say here without going into a long explanation (where words would probably fail anyway to capture what is essentially wordless)…all I can say is that that conversation—filling art journals for years—changed me. My creative self is now fully in charge of my life.

You can find a gallery of some of my favorite art journal pages that I’ve made over the years, here.

I ENCOURAGE YOU TO ART JOURNAL TOO.

You can find my best advice for art journaling below.

Art journaling is a practice. It’s a way of journaling, but visually. Like a writing journal, an art journal is a private, safe place to express yourself and make sense of your life—far away from other’s opinions or judgements—and it’s also a wonderful container to practice creating art. Again, without fear of what others might think, you can throw around anything you want—paint, ink, pastels, glue, paper, fiber—you can try new things, experiment, put stuff together and take things apart. You can learn how to work with new-to-you art media—and you can keep stretching. You can do anything in your art journal. It’s all yours.

KEEPING AN ART JOURNAL IS FOR ANYONE, ANYWHERE ON THEIR CREATIVE PATH.

It’s a great container for beginners to learn and explore art and mixed media, and it’s also part of a consistent art practice for all artists at all levels—because art making is always learning and exploring.

For me, I started art journaling as a beginner. My sketchbook is now my art journal—but it’s the same thing: a safe place to express myself, make wordless sense, practice. And my art journey continues.

IF YOU WANT TO ART JOURNAL TOO, HERE’S MY BEST ADVICE: