Author Archives: ajsartjournal

Unknown's avatar

About ajsartjournal

This blog is to share my adventures in art journaling. It's a journey of discovery and you are more than welcome to join me. A little bit about me … I’m English and live on the Isle of Wight which is off the south coast of England. I am retired and I’m married to the love of my life. We have been together as a couple since 1970 but only got married in 2007. before that we were just getting to know each other 🙂 We have had an amazing life together, travelled to distant parts of the world and lived life to the full. Sometimes when we look back at our life together we say “Wow! did we really do all that stuff?!” My husband has been very unwell for the past 10 years and I am his full time unpaid carer now. When he was younger he worked as an advocate supporting people who were detained in hospital under the Mental Health Act. He was also a musician and DJ. He is still interested in music and on good days our house is still filled with music. Me, I’m much more of a visual person, I love photography and images and now, of course, I love art journalling and being creative. We never had children, but we are now the proud parents to two beautiful cats called Bill & Jack (after Bill Burroughs and Jack Kerouac). They are getting old now and need more care and attention. Want to know anything else? Just ask 🙂 Big love AJ

Breathe, Calm, Connect

Posted on by
1

Breathe, Calm, Connect

 

Hello friends

We have had fantastic weather in my part of the UK this weekend and I’ve been busy.  I hope your weekend has been great too.

Yesterday I go up early and prepared for some voluntary work in the cemetery then did two hours work.  I was clearing grass and weeds away from the stones and carrying the waste to a bin nearby and my two friends were writing down the inscriptions from the memorials so we could add the information to our website.  I think I must have jarred my neck in doing the work because it’s been feeling a bit uncomfortable ever since then.

In the afternoon I did some work on my Story Box.  I have to have a story box completed by next Saturday, several of us are making them to show as examples of how people can use archives to tell a story.  My box is about a theatre that stood in the town from 1813 until 1961 when it burnt down.  One of the things I am putting in the box is a small book containing all the newspaper items that we have found.  I think there must be hundreds of them, it seems like that anyway.  I have typed them all out using a Old Newspaper style font, printed them, aged the paper by soaking it in tea and now I am tearing around the edges of the typed items, distressing the edges of the paper and sticking them in the book. This is just to give the ‘feel’ of ageing, I’m not trying to pass anything off as antique.

The ageing with tea took all yesterday afternoon!  Fortunately the weather was good so I was able to do most of it outside and didn’t drip tea all over the kitchen, that would have driven my husband crazy.  I worked on the tearing, distressing and sticking all evening but didn’t complete the job.

I started today by doing some updates to the RSHG website.  Then we drove over to the Garlic Farm to pick up some garlic bulbs for T to plant in the garden and to the big hardware store to picked up some items he needs for a project he is working on.

As it was such a beautiful day today I thought I would take Mum and Dad out for a drive and a walk this afternoon. Dad however said he would rather stay at home and watch the football on tv so must Mum and me went. We went to the village where I grew up and found the grave of my paternal great-grandparents in the church graveyard then we went for tea in, what I always thought was, a posh hotel. Surprisingly the service as abysmal and Mum complained about it!

This evening I’ve been doing more tearing, distressing and sticking and I’m still not finished!  As well as the book I have loads of stuff to print out to add to the Story Box which has to be completed by Saturday morning and I’ve got to presentation to prepare too.  I’m feeling just slightly under pressure right now.

Anyway, enough of the trivia of my exciting life.  The image above is a mixed media spread in my altered book.  I was just having fun with paint, papers, inks, printed tissue paper, collage and penwork.  I was going to say that I wasn’t sure what the words meant, they came to me out of nowhere, but now I realise I know exactly what they mean 🙂

I may not have time to post again until next weekend, so, in the meantime, I hope you have a great week.

Big love

AJ 🙂

 

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013 unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Bouncing Back

Posted on by
5

You're Always Bounced Back

 

Hello friends!

It’s been an odd sort of week so far, can’t quite put my finger on how or why though, so I’ll just have to keep going with the flow and see what transpires.

This is number 5 of the 8 illustrations (well actually 9 if you count the cover image) I did for Dr Amy Johnson‘s book Being Human (which is getting closer and closer to publication all the time and I am sooooo excited).  The page is reproduced here with Amy’s permission.

Amy asked me to include some images of her children in the collage elements but I did half the pages before I could pluck up the courage to start messing about with her two charming children. I am not sure why I was so reticent as Amy has been so easy to work for and so accepting of how I interpreted her words with my art, but I knew that inevitably I was going to make her children look ‘strange’ in my artwork and was worried that she, or they, wouldn’t like it.  Anyway half way through the project I realised that I had to take a deep breath and start including the kids.  So this page features Amy’s daughter and son – Willow and Miller – and their little dog.  There are also some other elements from photos Amy sent me.

The children were perfect for this illustration for the section Bouncing Back.  It’s about how, like children, we can all bounce back to our natural well-being when we perceive, or imagine, that things have gone wrong in our lives, as soon as we stop dwelling on the problems.

I have learnt such a lot from doing this project I can’t even begin to tell you how beneficial it has been for me.

Have a great rest of the week.

Big love

AJ 🙂

 

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013 unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Life Works Like Nature

Posted on by
2

Life Works Like Nature

Hello friends

I hope you had a great weekend, mine has been quite productive and I’m happy with that. Still got a ‘To Do’ list as long as my arm, but that’s always going to be the case and I am happy that I have achieved some things in my two days off work.

T has also been very productive, his garden has produced a fantastic crop this year and he has been busy making jam, dehydrating things, freezing stuff, making chutneys and preserving other produce in Kilner jars.   We will have a good stock of goodies to call on over the next few weeks and months.  I am so fortunate that my husband is a great gardener and a great cook, particularly as I am total rubbish at both 😉

Above is another illustration I did for Dr Amy Johnson‘s new book Being Human (which will be available before Christmas this year), and has been reproduced here with Amy’s permission.  I really like this page all the collage elements are from my own photographs, the flowers were growing in T’s garden this summer.  I love the quote and the message it gives.  

This section of the book is about Big Mind, Little Mind.  Big Mind is like the universal mind and it’s where we get our intuition, creativity, dreams and passion from.  Little Mind is our thoughts, the ones that rationalise everything, point out all the risks and reasons why we shouldn’t do things and, very often, talks us out of doing what we really want to do.  The truth is though that if we paid more attention to Big Mind and less to Little Mind everything would work out just as it’s meant to.  It sounds good to me 🙂

I’ll leave you to ponder on that thought and I’ll see you soon.

Big Love

AJ 🙂

 

 

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013 unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

We are the Architects of our own Happiness

Posted on by
Reply

We are the architects of our own happiness

 

Hello friends

I just felt like getting messy with some paint, so I got out my old, mixed media journal which I started in June 2012.  It’s a proper book that I am altering, mainly because I don’t like the wire binding in the other journals I’ve used for mixed media.  I like doing double page spreads and wire binding distracts from the whole image .  When I first started this altered book I ripped out half of the pages and gessoed the remaining pages, leaving some of the illustrations showing through.  It was a book about shells that I picked up in a charity shop and I’ve since seen several copies of the same book, so I don’t feel bad about transforming it into something else.

This page was already started.  I can’t remember the entire process but there are pages from an old book on English architecture, handmade papers, Zettiology stamps (purchased from Teesha Moore), red and pink paint, an image transfer, spray inks, distress inks and a quote hand printed onto ordinary paper sprayed with inks.

I’ve been reading a lot recently about how despite what we may think, our happiness is not dependent upon external factors like possessions or how we look, it’s simply a choice that we make for ourselves.  So I’m choosing to be happy and I hope you are too 🙂

See you soon

Big love

AJ 🙂

 

 

COPYRIGHT

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013, unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

No One is Truly Mean

Posted on by
7

No One is Truly Mean

Hello friends!

I hope you have had a great weekend, mine has been busy and interesting.

On Friday evening T and I went to see Alexi Sayle at the local art centre.  Normally Alexi is a stand up comedian, but for this event he was doing a book reading.  He was still funny and we both enjoyed the event.

Yesterday I did some voluntary work in the cemetery, I was cutting turf from around the kerbs of graves so my friend could record the inscriptions.  We did that for a couple of hours and it was a pleasant way to spend the morning.  Then I had a short walk into town to do some shopping and spent the rest of the afternoon working with a couple of friends in the Learning Centre in the Cemetery on Ryde Social Heritage Group‘s next project.  As soon as one thing ends we have to start work on another. 🙂

Yesterday evening T and I spent a lovely time together, we had a nice meal and then sat up late watching films and talking.  Unusually for me I stayed up very late and as a consequence today has been a bit of a wash-out.  We both slept in late and have had a slow day.  I did manage to get out to visit my parents this afternoon as it is their 63rd wedding anniversary today.  Heard some good news, that my brother who lives in France will be visiting for a short time in October.  That will be lovely for Mum and Dad.

The page above is the third illustration I did for Dr Amy Johnson‘s book Being Human.  I am working really hard to try and absorb this message, which in my heart of hearts I know is true. There are two people in my life who I find to be really mean and obnoxious and occasionally I have to deal with them face to face.  I find it difficult and up until now I don’t think I have handled the situation well. I am working on being kinder, more compassionate and more understanding of them and of myself.

Have a great week

Big love

AJ 🙂

COPYRIGHT

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013, unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

What’s the problem?

Posted on by
2

What's the problem?

Hello friends

Here we are mid-week and everything is just about back to normal, just a few things still to catch up with, but I’m getting there 🙂

This page is my second illustration for Dr Amy Johnson’s book Being Human. The section is about problem solving and it was a revelation to me.  You know how sometimes things are really obvious but you just can’t see them until someone points them out to you? Amy wrote about how many of our ‘problems’ are just the result of how we think about certain conditions and if we think about them in a different way they might not be problems at all. Wow!  But you will have to buy the book (when it goes on sale) to find out more 🙂

I really loved using my own photographs to make up the collage elements of this page. There are images from my garden, a holiday to Barcelona and from the town’s carnival. Then lots of pen work and great quote by Amy. I hope you like it.

I hope you enjoy the rest of your week and I’ll see you again soon.

Big love

AJ 🙂

 

 

 

COPYRIGHT

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013, unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Look Without Yesterday’s Filter

Posted on by
2

Without Yesterday's Filter

Hello friends

I am back after a really busy and successful week and all is good here, I hope things are great with you too.

So we transported our big exhibition to the old church and set it up and decorated the church to make it look as good as we could and opened to the public on Friday and Saturday.  It’s been a great success with lots of lovely feedback and some new people joining our group which is great.

Today we took everything down and transported it all back to where it belongs. The whole week has been a lot of hard work and good team effort and has definitely been worth it.

Tomorrow I go back to work and it will be good to be getting back to normal. I am hoping that now, having met both urgent deadlines, things will quieten down a little in my life, after a week of not making any art I am in urgent need of some art therapy. 🙂

As promised in my last post the page above is the first page I did to illustrate Dr Amy Johnson‘s new book Being Human (due out in in November). The chapter for this illustration is called Showing Up Dumb and it’s about how we often react to a situation with preconceived ideas, judgements and opinions, that is we let things that have happened in the past affect what happens today, but if we show up with a clear and open mind we truly and naturally react in the moment.

Have a great week everyone

Big love

AJ 🙂

COPYRIGHT

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013, unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Getting there :-)

Posted on by
2

Being Human

Hello friends!

I hope life is treating you well, I am fine.  One deadline achieved and the second one will be achieved by Friday of this week 🙂

So my first deadline, which I achieved a few days ago, was my secret project. Now it’s time to start telling you about what I’ve been working on and the image above is a little sample for you.

Early in July I was contacted by Dr Amy Johnson a psychologist and life coach from America who asked me if I would illustrate her second book.  Her first book is called Modern Enlightenment. After checking out Amy’s website I soon realised that I loved the things she wrote and decided to follow up her enquiry.  As soon as I spoke to Amy I knew I had met a genuine and authentic person and I agreed to do the artwork for her new book Being Human.  It will be available to buy before Christmas this year 🙂

I can’t tell you how honoured and excited I am to be a small part of this wonderful book.  In order to illustrate the quotes I have read several extracts from the book and it has been a fantastic journey for me.  To make sure we were both safe with regard to copyright issues I decided not to use magazine images for the collage elements and I used mainly my own photographs, some photographs of Amy’s family and a couple of images that are in the public domain.

Prior to this my artistic process had been to make the art and then find a quote to compliment it.  But for the book I had to start with the quotes Amy provided and then make my artwork fit them. It’s been a challenge and a huge amount of fun.

Amy is very wise and writes in a way that is easy to understand and take on board.  The whole experience has improved the quality of my life and Amy has been a joy to work with.

If you like my art I am sure that you will love Amy’s book Being Human and I will tell you when it is available for purchase in a few weeks time.  Personally I can’t wait to read the whole book 🙂

Obviously the artwork I produced now belongs to Amy but she has given me permission to share it with you.  Above are small sections from the 8 pages I produced and in the coming weeks I will be sharing the whole pages with you.

I am so grateful to Amy (and to the Tiny Buddha website –  it was on that website that Amy first saw my work) for this wonderful opportunity.

So my next deadline is less than a week away.  Next Friday my local history group, Ryde Social Heritage Group, opens a two day exhibition of local history in a big, old abandoned church in the town.  On Saturday we spent the whole day cleaning it, and on Sunday we started to transport and set everything up.  There is still lots to do and I am beginning to feel slightly pressured, but I have the whole of the week off work and by Friday morning we will be ready for a wonderful two day event event!

I will probably miss my mid-week post again on Wednesday due to preparation for the event but I will be back next weekend 🙂

My life is really, really good right now and I truly hope yours is too.

Big love

AJ 🙂

COPYRIGHT

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013, unless otherwise stated. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Deadlines!!!

Posted on by
Reply

Stand out!

Hello friends

I hope you are all well and happy.

I am doing fine and I’ve had a mainly enjoyable weekend.  I am hard up against two deadlines now that have to be delivered in less than two weeks.  I am confident that I am going to meet both deadlines as long as I stay focused and calm.  I did have a bit of a wake-up call today though.  I woke up at 7am and was feeling distinctly unwell so I decided to stay in bed for a while.  At 8am I woke up again and still felt bad so I decided to get up, I generally feel better once I am up and about.  I got myself a cold drink and took some painkillers for a pounding headache and decided to do some art.  Art is always good therapy.  But within about 20 minutes I realised that I was going to be sick and just made it to the bathroom in time.  Being sick made my head thump even more so I went back to bed.  I was sick one more time and then managed to get back to sleep.  When I woke up I thought it was probably about 10am and was shocked to see it was already 1pm, but fortunately I was feeling considerably better.

I got up and tentatively did some art just to make sure I was really feeling OK, then I had a shower and got dressed.  I thought that probably the best thing I could do was go out for a walk and get some fresh air, so I combined visiting my parents with taking Mum out for a stroll (Dad decided to stay at home at watch football).  Mum and I went to the park had a short walk then stopped and had a cup of tea in one of the cafes, another short walk and stopped for ice-cream before I took her home again.  It was a really lovely afternoon.

When I got home I suddenly realised that I needed to update the RSHG website, something I do at the beginning of each month.  Doing those updates took me up to dinner time, and now, updating the blog is probably going to take me up to bedtime.  Despite sleeping the whole morning away I’m sure I will need to go to bed at my normal time tonight (between 10-11pm).

Losing the whole morning today made me realise just how easy it would be to miss the deadlines and how I just have to keep working away at them steadily making progress all the time.  Also how fortunate that I didn’t lose a whole day or more due to sickness.  So if I miss my usual mid-week post on Wednesday it’s because I am still plodding away and making good progress.

I am really conscious that people leave comments on my blog and I am very bad at getting back to them or at answering questions.  I really do appreciate everyone who is kind enough to leave comments here, so THANK YOU everyone.  A few people have also asked recently if they can buy copies of my artwork.  I must admit it has come as a huge and pleasant surprise to me that anyone would want to, but I am afraid at the moment you can’t buy my art.  I will be looking into it after my two projects are successfully completed and you will definitely be able to purchase some of my artwork towards the end of the year, although maybe not in the format you were expecting.

The page above is page 4 of my 5th Teesha Moore inspired journal.  I have no idea who to attribute the quote to.

Have a good week everyone and I’ll see you soon.

Big love

AJ 🙂

COPYRIGHT

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Best laid plans…

Posted on by
1

Gratitude

 

Hello friends

Sorry I am out of synch with my posting again and this is also a day later than my usual midweek post, I’ll try and get back to normal soon.

OK I have to confess the plan to tidy up the art room (again) was a massive fail (again).  

When I woke up on Monday (bank holiday) it was a beautiful sunny day so decided to do something outside instead.  I find it fairly easy to find something better than tidying up my art room.

I am not really a gardener, in fact I’m not a gardener at all, but I do things like cutting the grass (occasionally), hard landscaping, building things and occassionally helping T out.

First thing on Monday morning I drove T to the local garden centre to purchase some tomato food and while we were there I noticed a lot of cyclamen plants in flower.  I said “I thought cyclamen were winter flowering plants”.   T replied, “Well ours are, or at least they were, I think you removed them all when you tidied up the woodland area of the garden recently”   Ooops!  I thought that was just dead stuff I was clearing up, he commented that it had only taken him 17 years to cultivate that patch.  I felt really bad, but he was philosophical about it and said “Well they might grow back, despite your best efforts to remove everything”!

He had previously mentioned to me that two branches of a  big Bay tree in the cemetery that were overhanging our garden, had begun to interfere with the television reception.  I hardly ever watch television so I was not aware of this.  T can’t go up ladders a) because of his dodgy leg and b) because of his vertigo so I got the ladders out, climbed up and sawed through the two branches, which (fortunately) fell onto the hedge between our garden and the cemetery.  T helped me drag them from the top of the hedge into the cemetery and then we cut them up and put the pieces into bags.

I put the bags into my ‘new’ car and drove to the local tip to dispose of the rubbish.

All of the above took up most of the day and I had just sat down, outside, on the decking to work on my art journal when T got a phone call.  I can’t go into details but he had to get to an urgent meeting in the next town in 15 minutes.  The trip normally takes 20 minutes but somehow I managed to get him there on time and then I had to hang around for a couple of hours until the meeting finished.   I didn’t really mind as I knew T was doing good work but it meant that there was no tidying of the art room and no art journaling either.

The page above is page 3 of my 5th Teesha Moore inspired journal and on this piece I was practising a different type of lettering.

That’s all for now folks, I’ve got to get on, my two deadlines are approaching fast and both at the same time and although things are going well I need to ‘keep at it’

See you soon

Big love

AJ 🙂

 

 

COPYRIGHT

© Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal, 2013. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Janette Gregson and ajsartjournal with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.