Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Latest pages...

Lots of writing, not much arting, but then the arting comes and goes. I still haven't finished the last of the black Artistico pages. I'm saving it to work on when I fly to Phoenix tomorrow. Or when I get there. Not that I won't have stuff to do when I get there, but it's always good to have a reward ready.

Why, you may wonder, am I going to PHX? Actually, I have a gig there, at The Jester Room of Pranksters Too. Now who could resist playing at a club called Pranksters? Cover is only $10 if you're in the area! I go on at 9...


Actually, I think the songs were written by a friend of Bruce's... I'll have to go back and add some marginalia there. I do that frequently: go back and add stuff in the margins... People's names, corrections, updates. Margins are wonderful things to have in a journal!



I doubt I'll post from Phoenix because I'm not sure if I'll have a scanner and the software I need to do it, but I may be able to post something. Who knows?

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Sheesh, I'm running out of titles...

More pages... The first is kind of sad, so don't read it if you can't handle something sad happening. Not much art, but there is some. I do find that I'm doing more art because I'm posting more. Which is really cool, in an odd way.

Skip this page, if you don't want to read the sad part...

All OK, from here on, I think.

Writing in your diary about other people's dreams posted on Facebook?

And, finally my take on Albert Camus. The Henri Cartier-Bresson photo appeared in The New Yorker... Article by Adam Gopnik. I loved Albert Camus when I was in  young!

Saturday, April 7, 2012

Más...

I haven't worked on anymore of the Artistico pages - I'm hoping to treat myself this afternoon - but I have been journaling, never fear...

That's my attempt at Neuland, a hand I really like. Bold, chunky, fun!

 
The number '49' is another number I love. Maybe it's because I'm a mathematician's daughter, or maybe it's because I'm just nuts, but I really love certain numbers. Especially odd numbers and prime numbers, and their factors. They're not just numbers to me, they're characters. But then so are words. I tend to anthropomorphize pretty much everything I come into contact with...

Ahh, yes, and here's another thing. Many people write me about how I do my journal pages. Do I write everything out first and then copy it into the journal? (NO!) How come I never make mistakes? And here's one on this very page: the page number, that lovely '49,' is wrong. This is actually page 51 (3x17), which is why '51' is written in above the very pretty 49.

When you make a mistake in a journal, you handle it just like you do in life. You admit it. You process it, you notice it. And then you move on. You're always going to make mistakes.


When you visit schools these days, you have to get a pass at the office and be escorted, unless you're a regular visitor. It's very different than it was in my day...

I love tins. I love roosters. So a tin with a rooster on it is going to come home with me... And this one contained Olive Oil, another thing I love!!!

I've started putting more photos in my journals. I'm doing it because when I read biographies or journals, I always want to know what the people in it look like... What the places they're at look like. If they're famous enough and have famous friends, you can find pictures, but otherwise you're out of luck. I don't want to subject y'all to the same experience!

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Three down, one to go...

I finished the spread in the black Artistico pages. It came out of a discussion with my friend, Nancy, about how bloody hard it is to paint roses. Other flowers are much easier, at least for me. Of course, antique roses have fewer petals... And that makes them much easier.

It's done with the NeoColor IIs: lots and lots of layers.

And here's the latest finished page:

Mostly Pentel ColorBrush... With little dots of Maimeri gouache...

Monday, April 2, 2012

The first of the missing pages...

Back to page 35, one of the missing pages on the black Fabriano Artistico. It's supposed to be a portrait of Roscoe Holcomb, but it doesn't look like him.

Still, I like the illustration. It's done with NeoColor IIs. I just like layering the colors up. It's coated with Krylon's Crystal Clear, in a probably vain attempt to keep it from leaving color on the opposite page.

I've got to admit it's getting better...

Thank you for all who've inquired about my back. It's much better, thanks to the OTC drug, Backaid, placed - oh so conveniently for those suffering from back pain, on the bottom shelf at the HEB... I told you I'd post a pick of the book covered with the goldfish paper, and then forgot, so here it is...

It's a flat spine book - like a kid's book - which you can't fold completely backwards, but is still quite a nice style for a journal. Because it's not 'shouldered' the pages all open flat-flat.

Here's the page I did yesterday after I posted... More music and color!

In the first 'M' of YUMM!! There's a spot of gold. It's Maimeri Gouache, which I love. (It's also coloring the OH, YEAH and BTW.) I carry three tubes of it (the deep and light golds and the silver) in my little tool caddy with me almost all of the time. My friend, Nena, gave me the little caddy thing. Well, actually, she gave me three, and I have the others loaded up with other art tools...

I cram a LOT of stuff into the little thing...

You can see a Niji water pen, some Pigma Graphics, a passel of Zig Calligraphy markers, four Pentel ColorBrushes, three Prismacolor Premier Markers, a couple pencils, a Sheaffer calligraphy pen (with a shadow nib in it), a bone folder and a partridge in a pear tree.

Sunday, April 1, 2012

¡April Fool's!

There are four pages missing in this post. In the middle of a couple of signatures, I sew in a sheet of black Fabriano Artistico, because I love doing colored crayons (the NeoColor II's although Roz is making me want to try the Stabilo Woodies) on black, or, really any darkish colored paper. But I never do these in sequence, because my journal is a pretty fast thing, and that kind of illo takes me awhile. So we left off listening to Rafe Stefanini channel Roscoe Holcomb...


I got this paper to use in my bookbinding class at AMOA. Usually I post the page with the foldover as a detail, but I love the colors on this spread, so I posted it this way! There's enough paper on a sheet of this to bind a smallish book - say 6 1/2" x 9 1/2" - using one side for the cover and the other for the endsheets. I did do a little book in the class with this (but not doing the endsheets with it), and I'll post a pic of that at the end of this...
















page 34





















I'm not showing 34 & 39 next to each other because that's not how they appear in the journal... One of the most fabulous things about living in ATX is the music. Bands play for free that are just wonderful. Sometimes the guys are sidemen for more famous guys, sometimes they were sidemen for famous guys, whatever... But they can all play the holy shit out of stuff. Caspar Rawls is one of those guys, Ernie Poole Ball, who played with Johnny Cash, is another.

My back has gone out three and a half times in the last year, and it's a PITA.  But that doesn't stop me from journaling!


I'm about to go out to the blugrass brunch at Opal Divine's. Maybe I'll do some more journaling there. 

I'd say it's pretty likely...