Art Journal Play

This is a page from my new art journal, inspired by Suzi Blu's cool video. She's got some great ideas and inspiration for anyone who wants to explore their creative side.

I was having so much fun rubbing on the pastel layers and scruffing up the paint layers that I got a small blister on my thumb. Hah! Of course if you want to avoid that, just rub with a scrap piece of paper and go slower.

The tree came up intuitively, while working on the theme, "Why I make art." I recognized it after I was done. We used to have a flowering crabapple tree that would get thick, thick, thick with pink blooms. Once when I was sick of playing with my younger brother, I climbed up into the tree and hid (we weren't especially chummy then, but we got to be pals). He could pass right by the tree and not see me because the blooms were so full. More magical than any fairytale and it forever changed the way I saw the world. The way those flowers were up so close, so intense. The loud buzzing from the bees, the sweet scent. It was one of my eternal moments- you know-those little moments that end up the most important? The pink tree, that moment of close observation, and the heightened senses to the point of euphoria are reasons I make art.

The photograph is of me when I was two or three. Of course that would be the first reason I make art.