Oil and Charcoal – who knew they went together?

Art Journal pages - week 2 of Strathmore class

Did you know that charcoal and oil pastel were made for each other? I didn’t either! And they are, they are! they smoodge together to make a shabby, messy mix of delight.

Scribble a bit of charcoal pencil, and scribble an  oil pastel over the top – then rub the concotion with your finger tip…and yes…beautiful. You can see the effect around the girls hair, around her neck, around her eyes…i like it – a lot!

And where did I discover this? At the FREE Strathmore paper online workshops that have just started. Come on over! It’s fun and you will pick up some great ideas and tips from our teacher, Pam Carriker, and from classmates. What I call Art Journaling, they call Visual Journaling, but it’s all the same thing.

The message on this page has been burning a hole in my head for a year! And it was as I was chatting with my BFF  on a quick trip to Sydney to see her while she is home from Singapore, that she managed to whip my jumbled, incoherent thoughts into a little neat parcel.

I have been struggling with explaining why drawing and Painting have become so, so, so important to me (and will just become more so!) and why photography is not my only obsession anymore. I have felt guilty over it ( my poor little camera is doing puppy dog eyes at me now, I can see it from the corner of my eye…). and worried that all that I have worked so hard to build would collapse if I allowed myself to expand in this new direction…but you know what? I can’t resist. I am growing and changing and EXPLORING MY IMAGINATION! I paint and draw things that don’t exist. I draw from memory, imagination, nothing  and everything. Oh Lord – save me! i’m babbling! just talking about this stuff ignites me.

ok, ok….deep breaths….and my photographic art is how I explore the KNOWN WORLD…because I am photographing things that already exist…Invention versus interpretation. Well, there is no winner. They are both the tools of an artist!  But it is invention that is getting me up at 5am every day!

But camera do not fear, I still love, and adore you – it’s just that we have an ‘open relationship’ now. You need to share me. My horizons expand, and so does my heart!

Jane