Art Journaling: Some Reading

Hi friends,

I wanted to share with you some of my favorite art journaling books.  These are all great for getting started with inspiration and generating ideas, as well as practical drawing, painting, collage, and mixed media techniques and book binding.

Nature Journals by L.K. Ludwig
Ludwig's other art journaling books Creative Wildfire and True Vision are also excellent, but this one is my favorite of hers.  I love a naturalist's journal and adding ephemeral pieces of daily life into a journal, so I love how Ludwig gathers from the natural world to create her journals here.  This book also provides a ton of interesting techniques that make use of natural phenomena and materials.

1,000 Artist Journal Pages: Personal Pages and Inspiration by Dawn DeVries Sokol

This book is simply that, 1,000 journal pages (included with some prompts) photographed individually with very little text.  It's a wonderful resource for visual inspiration and gives a sense of the vast possibilities with visual journals, no two alike.

The Decorated Journal:Creating Beautifully Expressive Journal pages by Gwen Diehn

Any of Gwen Diehn's books would be a great place to start with an art journaling practice.  I love that they discuss the different kinds of journals and the place of journaling in history in addition to art techniques.  This book has a useful guide to materials and goes over many different types of bindings.

What It Is by Lynda Barry

This amazing book isn't even really about visual journaling.  It's about writing, and somewhat about images, but I include it because it is so inspirational.  When I look at Barry's book, I know it's okay to be spontaneous with art, to draw badly, to have a unique style.  She also gives a lot of exercises to get you started writing.

Evidence: The Art of Candy Jernigan

Talk about a love of ephemera! I received this book for Christmas and haven't even read it yet--just looked through the pictures--and already I am amazed by it.  Jernigan's art is truly about documenting daily life through the objects with which we connect.  A beautiful book for journalers, collectors, snoopers, travelers, hoarders, the obsessive-compulsive, and artists.

Everyday Matters by Danny Gregory

I've talked about this book before, but I mention it again because it is wonderfully inspirational for those who like to draw in their journals.

Also check out the magazines Art Journaling and Cloth Paper Scissors Pages. They come out several times a year and I can find them at my local Barnes & Nobel.

These are just some books I've enjoyed and I'm sure there are many more out there. If you have any other suggestions, please leave them in the comments so we can all check them out!

Kisses,

Frau S.