Did you know that researchers have found that even 20 minutes of daily creativity can improve the quality of your life? This is why I’m going to teach you my favorite way to create fun collage papers. The papers can be used for all sorts of things, including adding colorful shapes to your art journal. Perhaps allowing you to dip into creativity even when your time is very limited.
No Rules Art Journal
In the free video, I’ll introduce you to my favorite tools and a few basic techniques, then I’ll show you a few fun ways to use your collage papers in your art journal.
Longing for something new I picked up a sketchbook and started painting the pages without concern. I knew there were rules or best practices but I decided to just do something and expect nothing. It was a beautiful escape from feelings of obligation and perfectionism, which frequently pushed me to check emails or read serious things usually pertaining to my career. You see, somehow I had been convincing myself that every waking second had to be productive. Until then, my favorite act of rebellion was to watch a movie or binge watch Netflix.
When I picked up that sketchbook, I was longing for creativity because the world of striving for a really great career became a world of justifying and checking off more and more boxes on a never-ending to do list. The more efficient I was, the more I got asked to do. While people say you should just say no, it was never that simple.
So I began to wonder how could something that started off so promising become something that felt more like a cage? Not having an answer, I turned to my inner child who was probably about 16. And, I just decided to do whatever I wanted in a simple black book with empty white pages. Some people would call it a sketchbook, but I called it an escape, and now I look back at that first art journal in awe of what I did and how I felt. Something transformative happened during that time and fortunately, I have a record of that and the (re)start of my art journey.
So, now that you’re intrigued, you’re probably wondering, what if I can’t draw what I see or what if I don’t have any artistic skill, or what if I don’t know what to make? My answer to all of these questions is why don’t you just play with color, marks, and collaged papers? My backup answer is it really doesn’t matter even if you make a big ol’ mess…this is all about having fun and learning by doing. In a sense that is what creativity is all about…just doing what we feel like and learning from it. And, my hypothesis is that’s why our full-time careers are not fun anymore, because most of them do not allow for creativity and failed attempts at doing something new. So, remember there are no rules, just a few suggestions.
My absolute favorite art escape is making monoprints with a gel plate. They’re so simple and so inexpensive to make, that you can make tens to hundreds of prints for just about the same amount of money. Then with the abundance of printed papers, you can rip or cut pages into pieces however you like and adhere them into your art journal. Remember there are no actual rules! Then using any drawing medium – pens, pencils, markers, crayons, pastels (really any type of pastel you like) – you can add marks. And, if for some reason you don’t like those marks add another piece of paper…one of your monoprints or something you’ve printed out from a computer or perhaps something you cut out from any other pre-existing book or magazine. And, if you’re feeling really brave, add some paint directly to the page.
I filled my first art journal in a matter of just a few months. I adhered a few things that were done on loose paper, including a few old drawings that I’d kept or other things that I tried. I journaled in the book during the pandemic and then covered up the words with paint. I wrote little life stories, including a funny message from a deceased family pet who liked to chase deer. I collaged in a few things from my daughter’s trash pile including her math homework. I explored a few drawing techniques by first collaging in pictures that I drew over with thin layers of paint. I made pages with fun inspirational messages and I made pages with various strange concepts, one of which included a map page of Roswell NM because I wanted to remember a trip that we made there almost a decade earlier. My pages are all for me. They have been shared with my immediate family only, but they’re not something that I would want to post on social media.
Although looking at art journal posts on social media can be fun, I would very strongly caution you to just do whatever you feel like doing without much consideration to what others are doing and definitely do not compare your work with others, because this art journal is for you and you cannot really know what prior experience the other people who post their work have.
No Rules Art Journal
In the free video, I introduce you to my favorite way to make collage paper with a gel plate and a few basic techniques,
then I show you how to use your collage papers in your art journal.
About Lynn Mazzoleni
Lynn Mazzoleni is an emerging artist and chemistry professor with a PhD in Environmental Chemistry from the University of Nevada, Reno. She studies the molecular chemistry of pigments and she teaches chemistry to university students. Lynn's artwork is rich with emotion and fempowerment messages. She founded and co-hosts the Art Infused Life Podcast featuring inspiring artist stories. She resides in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, near Lake Superior, and is passionate about using her academic and artistic talents to inspire women to pursue their dreams.
No Rules Art Journal
In the free video, I’ll introduce you to my favorite tools and a few basic techniques, then I’ll show you a few fun ways to use your collage papers in your art journal.
