An art journal is the same as a written journal. The difference is an art journal incorporates more color and images. You can incorporate many different mediums. acrylic paint, watercolor, images from books and magazines, tissue paper, and anything your imagination and heart desires.
Art journaling is a way of creatively keeping records of your memories, thoughts, and emotions, not just with words, but images, cut-outs, colors, stickers, and more. Art journaling can be very personal, so there is no right or wrong when doing it. You need to enjoy the process and not be afraid of making mistakes, since there are no rules.
Let’s talk about the actual Art Journal books
You can art journal in any kind of book, really! My very first art journal book, was a sketchbook from Artist’s loft, with very flimsy pages, but good enough to work on as many pages as I wanted. I also have a small notebook, just a normal notebook to take notes. That’s now one of my art journal books too. An old book can be your art journal or some cut-to-size watercolor paper can help you start your art journal journey.
Materials/Mediums
Don’t feel limited because you don’t have the fanciest and latest arts and crafts supplies shown by people that work as an artist and have been doing for years, therefore accumulating many materials.
As mentioned before, you can use whatever materials are available to you. When I started art journaling, I would look into old books, or on the internet for images that I needed (look for copyright-free images on the internet). Sometimes I would just draw the images I wanted because I didn’t have the stamps (Simple things, because I’m horrible at drawing).
I have many journal books started, but I couldn’t finish any of my art journals yet. As someone that some days feels like completing a small page, some other days has the urge of working on a bigger journal book, it’s a never-ending process, but I’m ok with that.
Please use any supplies that you have available to you, like paints, markers, pens, washi tape, Oil pastels, and dry pastels. I still have the super cheap acrylic paints that I got in the clearance aisle at Michaels and I still, love them. You better believe that they get the job done. You can see some of them in use in one of my videos below.
Start your Art journal journey and Happy Crafting!!
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