several posts back i wrote of wanting to capture and record the various colour palettes, snippets of cloth and thread, and notes about materials i am drawn to, things i use in my work and writings that resonate
a kind of commonplace book on making
a start has finally been made on it after months of searching for just the right book to keep it all in
can't say i found the right book... the one originally intended turned out not to be practical and so the quest began
other than the white pages everything else about this one is wrong but the urge to begin was to strong and this was all that was available so here i go
the front pages (endpapers) were a strange shade of lilac so i covered one with a strip map of the yukon river, beginning at marsh lake
the title page has a small collage made from a wildflower pressed last year that was in rather poor shape so i covered it with gesso and quite liked the look of it
no title yet, still pondering that
yesterday i worked on the first colour palette page... using scraps of the papers from my work here
it's a subtle one, lots of whites and creams, beige, a greyed lilac, smoky blue, green/brown and brown/black... the colours that surround me here everyday
i'm glad to have finally begun and keen to see how it goes, hoping it's something that can be easily kept up
sifting through the scraps of paper, shuffling them from here to there, had me thinking of collages and the dozens of flowers pressed last summer
small collages that take me back to those beautiful summer days
two 2" squares per page of a double-page spread
first, a water-soluble graphite pencil in midnight black, followed by fragments from the black & white images of the klondike... then torn bits of art papers and magazines
once that dried marks were added with a black pigment marker and then a light wash here and there using a slate-green water soluble graphite pencil
lastly, re-tracing the outline with the black marker
some torn edges, some cut... trying not to be predictable
working on four at once kept it lively, not letting me to get too caught up with any one in particular
my scrap paper pile is finally dwindling but there are a few more of these in me yet
it's such a great way of capturing what inspires whilst at the same time offering yet more to think about
3 comments:
Oooh the thought of a new commonplace book in the making excites me enormously. Such a beautiful start you have made on it and I have no doubt you will keep it up. It's what you do! Love this to bits.
Something lovely here - I'm looking forward to seeing where it takes you!
Trying not to be predictable? You are never that! I find it endlessly interesting how you can take the most seemingly mundane raw materials and turn them into miniature works of art.
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