From Trash to Treasure: Revisiting an Old Art Journal

In a recent "decluttering" expedition in my studio, I stumbled across an art journal I filled in 2003. It's a 5x7 inch wire coiled hard cover unruled journal with around sixty pages. The paper was high quality, so I decided to experiment with water color paints and some text. Compared to my usual style, these paintings were very "loose" and were done while I was sitting on my porch in at the part observing nature.

I've always hated this journal. Not the journal, itself, but what I did to the poor thing. Even though I was satisfied with the fact that I filled it with a month's worth of art, I wasn't proud of the pages or anything else about the contents of this book. It went with me everywhere I went (I didn't use my favorite watercolor medium pencils, but rather cakes and brushes) and it kept me inspired to create on a whim. That's all it did, though.

So, away this book went into the shuffle of mish-mosh I have floating from one part of my studio to another. Over the years, I've moved several times and, with each move, I've contemplated throwing it away instead of packing it in a box. I didn't, though, and this decision to keep something I really didn't like baffled me. Why was I holding on to this thing? It's trash.

I forgot about it over the past two years until stumbling on to it the other day. I looked through, as I've done so many times, and still didn't like what I saw. What was I thinking when producing these pages? Why didn't I get into detail with this, why did I just blob the paint on with that, why did I write about absolutely nothing of interest of there? The questions poured through my mind as I revisited this time in my life when things seemed as simple as the pages I was creating in this little book.

Then it occurred to me exactly WHY I was holding this book in my hand. This book wasn't finished. Yes, the book was FULL . . . but it wasn't complete. Okay, this brought on a flood of inspiration, thoughts, ideas and concepts. My hands started hurrying through the book as I looked at each page with a new set of eyes. It was amazing. This revelation of unfinished-ness.