WEARY ....

 

This page demonstrates that, even when you're very very tired, you can still make art out of it!  I had a space of time and really wanted to work in my journal because it always brings me peace and healing.  However, when I sat down I felt like my mind and body were so weary that I was completely out of ideas.  So I turned that into a journal subject.

The first thing was to paint the page below my favourite intense lime green and then started to add grey/neutral pieces of collage from my stash.  I harvest material from catalogues, magazines and wherever I can find it, but much prefer dull finish paper.  The shiny stuff is a bit flimsy when using wet glue and then difficult to photograph without reflections.  One way around this, when I find something lovely but shiny, is to paste it to a sheet of paper and then copy it - which gives me the option of black and white, a matte image, and one that I can reproduce.  I make a lot of collage sheets this way, but be warned that you need to think about copyright issues if you plan to do the same.

Below you can see yet more collage, including the Modigliani lady who looks suitably glum/tired, and here I've also added the grey shadow and the black line which both unifies the elements and makes them stand out.

The process of journalling must have begun to lift my spirits because, without really meaning to include them, these red lines crept in.  Then I added the wording, including the expression "bone tired" which unfortunately ended up a bit squashed against the collage.

In the final version below you can see that I addressed that problem by painting over it and then shortening the sentence by leaving out one word.

I'm not sure why I added the doodly red and orange lines, except perhaps that they look vaguely cellular, so maybe my subconscious was registering my tiredness at a deep physical level?  I don't actually know, and that's not important enough for me to worry about.

This kind of physical exhaustion is something that goes with both of the auto-immune diseases which affect me, and is the cause of the greatest limitation on my daily life.  I don't have the energy that most people take for granted, so can only give what there is to a few.  These days just going down into the village for a cup of coffee with a friend is an exciting outing, but it teaches me to enjoy the small and simple pleasures life offers in a big way ...