Yet more paint splish sploshing about - you'd never guess I used to really hate using the stuff would you? Below you can see what passes for an "arty" background with me - I was just splodging around on top of a gesso coat, rubbing paint in with a babywipe and then smearing some or all of it off again: nothing very clever but it looked OK. Its easy to forget that you're going to write/draw all over it, which means it doesn't have to be anything more than a bit interesting.
I also used a mask and some dark blue paint to give me the honeycomb effect, and then for some reason drew a white line across the page with a Posca paint pen. It must have made sense at the time, but I can't for the life of me remember why!
The writing I then added was done with Promarker - although I am a fan of these I do think the range of blue shades is a bit disappointing, and I've actually added a few blue Copics to my collection to get the colours I want.
The idea of the unsuspected self really appeals - don't think its original, I probably read it somewhere, but the concept speaks to me. It works particularly well in terms of journalling for me because, so often, I am amazed by what comes out when I just go with the process and let it happen. Sometimes things come out I didn't know I was feeling, or hadn't understood were forming a barrier I needed to get past. Stuff like that.
I also have this thing where I get stuck in monochrome mode and work pretty much in one colour the whole way through - shades of blue in this case. I do admire the work of Teesha Moore and wish that (more often anyway) I could work in the variety of vivid colours she uses. Its somethng I'm working on but clearly wasn't expressed here.
There's something almost biological about the structures I've drawn - arterial branches and cells perhaps - an organic element anyway. It may have been deliberate .... not sure now.
But it makes sense doesn't it - if the body is a temple of the holy spirit then it is also sacred ground, a space which contains all our deepest meaning .... and indeed the unsuspected self, the true self that sometimes we don't even show to ourselves let alone others?
Gosh, I am in reflective mode today! Its probably because tomorrow we fly up and away - visiting Virginia in the USA. Fear not, I have packed a small travel journal with prepared background pages, plus some new drawing materials and a notebook ... just in case the spirit moves me to work in one of them. What's the betting I'll be so busy eating ice-cream and gazing at the views that I forget to do any of it?
See you in a couple of weeks or so.
Rosie X
