Best art journaling supplies for beginners

So now that you know what an art journal is, and have a list of inspiring art journal books handy, let’s get right into gathering some essential art journaling supplies so we can start creating!

There are a huge variety of art journaling materials available in the market, and it can quickly get overwhelming trying to figure out exactly what you need! While it is fun to experiment and play with all the wonderful art journaling supplies available on the market, you really only need a few basic supplies to get you started.

1. An art journal


The most important, of course, is an art journal!Continue reading→

{B} Best books for art journaling

I believe that you can learn anything and everything from books. So it should come as no surprise that I have quite a collection of art books. Here are a few of my absolute favouries that I am sure will help you on your art journaling journey.
The Journal Junkies Workshop: Visual Ammunition for the Art Addict by Eric Scott and David Modler

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{A} Art journaling 101

Art + Journal = Art Journal!

An art journal is simply art that you create in a book, on loose sheets of paper, or even on upcycled cardboard boxes, that you can then bind into a book or keep in a box. It’s a record of your journey, your thoughts, the things that move you, and your unique vision of the world.

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Book Review: The Blue Bath by Mary Waters-Sayer

From the back cover:

Kat Lind, an American expatriate living in London with her entrepreneur husband and their young son, attends an opening at a prestigious Mayfair art gallery and is astonished to find her own face on the walls. The portraits are evidence of a long-ago love affair with the artist, Daniel Blake. Unbeknownst to her, he has continued to paint her ever since. Kat is seduced by her reflection on canvas and when Daniel appears in London, she finds herself drawn back into the sins and solace of a past that suddenly no longer seems so far away.

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The A to Z of Art Journaling

 I’m thrilled to announce that I will be participating in the Blogging From A To Z Challenge this year! I participated in the 2014 challenge, and I have to say it was both exciting and exhausting. It also left me somewhat burnt out. But this year, I’ve had more time to prepare and I’ve decided to stick to a theme, which I think made this whole process so much easier!

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Book Review: Our Moon has Blood Clots by Rahul Pandita

Rahul Pandita was fourteen years old in 1990 when he was forced to leave his home in Srinagar along with his family, who were Kashmiri Pandits: the Hindu minority within a Muslim-majority Kashmir that was becoming increasingly agitated with the cries of ‘Azadi’ from India. The heartbreaking story of Kashmir has so far been told through the prism of the brutality of the Indian state, and the pro-independence demands of separatists. But there is another part of the story that has remained unrecorded and buried. Our Moon Has Blood Clots is the unspoken chapter in the story of Kashmir, in which it was purged of the Kashmiri Pandit community in a violent ethnic cleansing backed by Islamist militants. Hundreds of people were tortured and killed, and about 3,50,000 Kashmiri Pandits were forced to leave their homes and spend the rest of their lives in exile in their own country. Rahul Pandita has written a deeply personal, powerful and unforgettable story of history, home and loss.

our-moon-has-blood-clotsContinue reading→

Moving into fear

Basic painted face

A quick face painted with acrylics

How do you deal with fear? A lot of people will tell you it’s only by moving into whatever it is that you fear that you can overcome it. But how do you move into what you fear? How do you go boldly (or not so boldly) ahead into a situation that gives you the shivers? I’ll be the first to admit that I didn’t have a clue.

Then, I took up painting. And as I tried and experimented and failed and tried again, I realized – this is how you move into fear!

You move into fear by sticking with something even when you’re scared and have no idea what the hell you’re doing. It means taking a piece you don’t like and working it until you do. And if you still don’t like it, chalking it up to experimenting and experience, and then cutting it up to use as the base of another piece, so you can reframe and redo.Continue reading→

Delhi Lens: Art Show: Deck of Cards

Deck of Cards | Taash Ke Patte brochureOn a recent Saturday, while I was struggling – and failing – to paint a vase of impressionistic flowers, a friend invited me to join her for the preview of an art show at the British Council. Titled Deck of Cards | Taash ke Patte, this is a unique show that juxtaposes the state of Indian art in 2016 with that of the UK from the 1970s.

It all started in 1976, to be precise, when a UK-based gallery sent 54 leading British artists a playing card and asked them to interpret that card using any medium of their choice. The show, when it opened, was a resounding success. Over the years, the entire collection has toured to over 22 countries and resulted in a physical pack of very artful playing cards that are still available today.Continue reading→

Of Epilogues & Sequels

ep·i·logue
ˈepəˌlôɡ,ˈepəˌläɡ/
noun
noun: epilogue; plural noun: epilogues; noun: epilog; plural noun: epilogs
  1. a section or speech at the end of a book or play that serves as a comment on or a conclusion to what has happened.

There are a lot of books that pull us into their world, and when they end, we wish there was a sequel.  Or something more. We long to know what happened next.

One example is the Harry Potter series. Seven books later, and the internet still breaks every time J.K. Rowling gives us another little snippet from that world. Or Erin Morgenstern‘s Night Circus – where is the circus now? Whatever happened to Celia and Marco?

One book that’s been haunting me recently is Helene Wecker’s The Golem and the Djinni. This is my epilogue to the story.Continue reading→