Illustrated Watercolor Journaling
" Christina took a lovely trip to Paris in July with girlfriends and enjoyed the time away to play and get creatively inspired! A must for everyone; whether it is in the next town or all the way to Paris! This trip was extra special to me because it has been nearly 10 years ago that I came to Paris with different girlfriends and I started Watercolor Journaling for the first time. Full circle! Yay!"
"Journal writing has been catching on lately – so much so that it has become a new verb – "journaling." With everyone’s lives so busy in this rushed high tech world, it is nice to take some time, slow down and record some of life’s details.
As the world gets more immediate, more online and easy to delete, the journal is a low tech, highly tactile method of capturing aspects of your world. A variation on the written journal is an illustrated journal -- adding the richness of hand drawn images to words.
In the class, "Illustrated Watercolor Journaling" students learn how to pay attention to their world and see -- then draw -- things that are important to them. Anything might strike fancies – a child’s soccer game, the first tomato of the season, or images from vacations. Nothing will be boring again."
I love the idea of illustrated journaling and would love to buy the notes available on the site but I'm not sure if they ship internationally. The pages of the moleskine are just heavy enough to handle a little bit of water without buckling, perfect for a dabble in line and washes.
Posted by: JoHunter | June 01, 2005 at 03:48 AM
The sketchbook Moleskines do hold up well to a little watercolor, however, as has been discussed at length here previously, watercolor pencil with a touch of water "sticks" better to the paper than straight watercolor, which beads as if there was a slight coating to the paper or some sort of resistance. I haven't let that stop me from using pencils and traditional watercolors (as well as markers, WhiteOut, gouache, India ink, gel pen, graphite, glue, crayon, and anything else that comes to hand while out and about) in my Moleskines.
The journals the link-site shows are nice, but do you really need a class to be told to get out there with some sort of medium and some paper and draw things that catch your interest? If you're going to take a class or buy a book, why not go for a traditional drawing class/book? As an artist, and former manager of an art school, I can promise that your painting, printmaking, whatever will improve with a strong grasp of shape, shading and perspective -- the very things you learn from drawing and then can apply to all the "sexier" mediums.
Practicing drawing skills was the very reason I started carrying a Moleskine sketchbook around with me. It's fun to make sketches of my travels, but the intent is to keep those foundational skills sharp enough to allow me to do the more serious stuff when I get home to the studio.
Posted by: Alia | June 01, 2005 at 08:20 AM
I've had a couple of classes and books on more traditional methods of drawing/painting but have always found them daunting and my results disappointing. What I want from an illustrated journal is to just be me, not to worry about technique and just try and express myself. I'm certainly no artist but I think colour and lines can help say as much as writing can.
On another note, does anyone know of a waterproof pen that works well with the Moleskine? My uniball micron feathers a bit.
Posted by: JoHunter | June 02, 2005 at 08:34 AM
The watercolor discussion begins here with a link back to previous discussions, too. http://www.moleskinerie.com/2005/03/moleskine_sketc.html#comments
The pen question is probably addressed here (or at least that would be the place to pose the question). http://armandfrasco.typepad.com/moleskinerie/2004/01/moleskine_pens.html
Posted by: Alia | June 02, 2005 at 02:28 PM