Mediocrity

Subtitle: Wanda's Way is My Way

"If I find an activity that brings me simple happiness, I can permit myself to treasure it as it is...whether I objectively suck at it or not."  Kerry Duncan

The quote came from an article in the Guardian called The Joy of Mediocrity! Thanks for the link Roseanne!

I'll have to say....this little spread in the art journal makes me smile....in all of its magnificent mediocrity. And I love that it's such a mixture of things. You get a glimpse of the eucalyptus stencil experiment from a few days ago on the left...a circle watercolor I did a long time ago that I chopped up and stitched into the book...a piece of a napkin there in the middle....my first experiment with the eucalyptus mask in the middle right....another view of Lynne's collage...and finally a little peek at another quote from Broken For you:  "It was not, however, not Wanda's way."

I keep saying I'm not an art journaler....but I'll have to admit....I'm having fun filling up this art journal. 😉  

Can you spot the difference between the two photos? I felt the watercolor was just too bright. As an artist I admire taught me...if something is too much of itself just give it glaze.  So I painted over it with a very light wash of Golden Zinc White paint...which is very transparent. It knocked down the color a bit....and I think it made a difference....however so slight.

I also used the zinc white paint to knock down the intensity of the dark green in the napkin cut out. When you separate the layers of a napkin and glue them down...the background just disappears....making them great for collage. 

I love this napkin...and have several more cutouts to use somewhere.  I'm not sure where I got it....but for some reason I think it has a connection to you, Tracie. Does it look familiar?

I sneak napkins in my pocket from parties all the time. 

For this eucalyptus I layed the mask down right on the page....and blotted watercolor around it. I added some speckles and touches of another green....and outlined it a bit with pencil. I think it's kind of sweet. I'm looking forward to playing with these stencils and masks more!

 

I had to do a lot of fixing on the quote on the next page...but it doesn't matter. I'm pretty happy with mediocrity in this art journal. This is the excerpt from the book just before the quote about Wanda's studio I shared a few days ago. I love this passage too....so I'm glad it's in the journal....even with all its flaws.

Here's the actual passage from Broken For You by Stephanie Kallos

Wanda's way....is my way!

"Some artists keep their source ideas out of sight and neatly organized - in file cabinets or closets perhaps, or in carefully labeled boxes.  These artists are serial monogamists.  They take on one project at a time and see it through to its completion.  They focus with exclusivity, putting up firewalls that cannot be breached by the incursion of other ideas.  If other inspirations whisper to them, they might take notes, they the shelve them. This kind of artist makes her ideas stand in a queue. She asked them to kindly wait their turn. She promises she will get to them, she keeps her appointments, but she insists upon seeing them one a a time. It is one perfectly viable way of working. It, was not, however, Wanda's way."