A Favorite Method of Art Journaling

Pink leftovers
Today a simple page featuring pink leftover scraps, created on loose paper to later be bound into an art journal.

Sometimes I think this is my favorite kind of art journaling: picking up little bits of this and that and just gluing it down on a page. It doesn’t involve very much thinking, yet it frees up my mind and makes me calm and happy!

There is no planning going on, but because the first bit I picked up happned to be pink the rest of the scraps follow suit and makes a theme. A page comes together almost without effort.

On this page you might spot: bits from my handpainted paper stash (spray painted etc), bits of packaging, address label, book pages, post-it-note with doodles, magazine clipps, Christmas wrapping paper, tape – and more! All scraps are rather small, the page is just 16×16 centimeters (6,2×6,2″), but together they form a unit that tells a story of me. That’s why this is “journaling” to me: it tells a story (to me). Not sure what it is to someone else though.

Have you tried this method of making a collage or “art journaling”? It’s a favorite of mine for sure.

15 Responses

  1. The no thinking part is definitely good ! I love using bits too. I have been neglecting my art journal for the past 6 months or so. I can feel the desire to get back to it rising in me. I think the fall and the dark will bring me back to it.
    Happy creating, Amazing One !

  2. I often create the base of art journal pages by either using up leftover paint on my palette or gluing down random paper that’s on my workspace. It’s fun and you never know what you’ll end up with! Yours is very happy looking.

  3. The no thinking is the best for me too. Love freeing up the mind and letting in wander in your pink garden of collage. xox

  4. i agree…….some of my best work (in my opinion) starts this way, with no real plan just making a start with something.

  5. Hi Hanna….This is my very most favorite way to fill a page. I don’t know what it is about paper and glue…but it’s a very fun and medatative way to visual journal. Love your page!!!

  6. This is great! Not only if you just feel like manipulated some different materials and textures but also a great starting place if you feel daunted by a blank page.
    Thanks for sharing this post!

  7. This is my very favorite approach to art journaling…I love the process of selecting and arranging all of those disparate elements into a collaged page that appeals to me. I often think that I need to go back to add paint or journaling to “finish”, but I’m not sure that’s truly the case!

  8. Hanna, I have an ugly little secret to admit:

    I so much admire the way you journal and I always start out to put little bits of the pretty scraps I save, onto pages and journal that way. And every single time I try to do this, I end up thinking too much!! I try and try! You have a lovely gift of being able to do this, and I get all my papers ready to use, and my glue and even my sewing machine. But then, I can’t just relax and do it!! I can’t decide what paper to use where to put it, what if some of it gets covered up, or some of it is shiny and some of it isn’t, and on and on and on! I am going to practice more this weekend.
    Also I am going to try not to comment again. This is too much blabbing for you to read at once!

  9. love the way you journal. i’m feeling the need to cut and paste lately. i have a lot of loose pages that i want to bind together but am not sure how i want to do it. how do you assemble your loose pages into a journal ?

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