mixed media art journal round robin kick-off

A while back, I put out a call for participants in an art journal round robin, thanks to the kindness of Karen at MMSA. I used her blog figuring I'd get people who were timely, artistic, prolific and pleasant, since that's the only kind of people I run into there. I ended up with 5 women from around the country, and we're about to send our journals out for the first leg of their journey. 

We were to make or buy a journal, do a couple spreads to set the tone for our theme/color/style, and be ready to mail by the 3rd Monday in August. I made a journal using 300lb watercolor paper for the covers and 90lb watercolor paper for the signatures. 

I bound it using some upholstery fabric (from a dumpster diving expedition my friend Moneka made a decade ago. I've been hauling boxes of fabric around all these years using it here and there) and the diamond X stitch. 

The covers were collaged with random papers, stamped a bit, painted with acrylics, collaged with a few layers of crinkled dress pattern tissue, then painted and stamped again. They look a bit leather-like in person and I'm very pleased with them. The inside covers - not so much, so I'm going to do more with them when it comes home 6 months from now.

I did this spread in the art journal class I'm teaching, working from an Oprah magazine, trying to get them to see the way a crazy batch of unrelated stuff can come together in a collage. I like it but it's sooo different from the next one that it's hard to believe I made both of them. And it's weird to look at them together like this. Makes me think maybe I'm a bit schizo LOL. 

This spread is very vintage in feel and fact - almost all original ephemera. The woman is a gel medium transfer of a picture I've used before. I just love her and the transfer was already made from a demo I did in class. The ledger page is from a purchased lot, the envelope flap is from (I think) my friend Julie-in-San-Diego's mom's history notebook which she gifted me with, the blue PAID bit is from a batch of old receipts. The reprint envelope is from my mom's old box of negatives, the postage stamps are from the huge baggie Rhonda gave me, the Clark's strip is from some old crochet thread. I'm very happy with this spread. It's so me.

I struggled trying to settle on a theme and eventually decided that I just want people to cut loose and make good art in whatever mode they're in the mood for, just like I did with my two wildly disparate spreads. I'll post the journals and my work in them as they come thru. Should be interesting.