CourageThis season we are collaborating with a partner, or being our own cheerleader. Download the Season Sidekick for a list of prompts to work from. Char and Claudette are choosing three items...
Week 1 – Tea bags + paint + found words
Dig in
Art Journal Catalysts
Acrylic
Challenge: Online Inspiration to Art
We always hear about using Pinterest for inspiration. Let’s make a pin board of things we love and use it to inspire endless journal pages!
Challenge: Three, Two, One
Explore ways to create pages with a simple formula of 3 colors, 2 words, and 1 image. This formula opens us up to endless possibilities to create unique layouts.
Promise Inspir-action
We always hear about using Pinterest for inspiration. Let’s make a pin board of things we love and use it to inspire endless journal pages!
Challenge: Freedom of Limitations
Create four journal pages, one for each of the following themes: Inspired by a Mess, Out for a Walk, Something Messy Something Clean, and View From my Window. The trick is to make your pages FAST and INTUITIVE! So impose the following time limits: One page should take 5 minutes, one should take 10 minutes, one should take 20 minutes, and one should take 40.
Challenge: Movement as a Distraction
We constantly are moving, doing, and staying busy in our daily lives. How can we carve away slivers of time for peace and creating? In this journal we will connect to a moment of calm in the midst of the chaos playing on contrast and complimentary colors to highlight this dichotomy in our lives.
Challenge: Artist Affirmations
I love to incorporate artist affirmations into my art journal practice. Let’s create a beautiful and meaningful art journal spread to silence our inner critics.
Challenge: Wild Abandon
Moments#gmseasonofmomentsYour challenge, should you choose to accept it: Create with wild abandon. Let go of perfection and expectations and gather things that you love. Art...
Challenge: Transformation
Moments #gmseasonofmoments Your challenge, should you choose to accept it: Create an art journal page using the word Transformation as the theme. Bonus points: Limit your...
Challenge: Color Interactions
Explore how colors interact with each other. Experimenting with color in your journal helps you find brush strokes and color combinations you may never have thought to try before! Make rainbows, mix colors, and see which new colors you can make from the tubes of paint you already have!
Challenge: Rooted
New#gmseasonofnewYour challenge, should you choose to accept it: Go back to your roots.I went back to my roots by going back to old journals. Here are some more ideas: copy one of...
Mindfulness Through Art
Mindfulness#gmseasonofmindfulnessMindfulness. Turning towards ourselves and listening. Being patient and curious and open. Imagine how much our...
How to Create a Scraps Diary
In this video, Autumn Moon shares what exactly a Scraps Diary is about. She pages through her Diary and shares the spirit behind it, the guidelines, the essence, and what it means to her. Video Transcript Please note that this transcript has been automagically...
Self Love through Collage
Worthiness#gmseasonofworthiness This lesson was originally released in the Season of Kindness. It holds so much value for the Season of Worthiness that - for the first time...
Envelope Pocket Journal
Finishing#gmseasonoffinishingLet's set ourselves up to finish strong this year. I'll be showing you how to create and easy envelop pocket journal that can be accommodated into...
Finishing with the Unfinished
Finishing#gmseasonoffinishingLet's finish our journal spreads with unfinished things. I know I have a lot of sketchbooks and journals of pages I didn't finish, forgot about, or...
Painting a ‘scene’ in your art journal
Spark#gmseasonofsparkOk so let’s get started! The goal is to create a ‘scene’ or a full painting spanning 2 pages or a spread in your art journal. Use whatever...
Time Capsule
Spark#gmseasonofsparkLet’s go back in time! This gave me a great excuse to look through my old art journals and reference photos and match them up. I’ve realized...
Lettering
Belonging#gmseasonofbelongingTurn your monoprinted pages into lettering with Mou's technique.Transcript (this transcript is automatically generated and is sure to contain...
Bonus: Going large in an A3 sketchbook
Season#gmseasonoflessTaking everything we've learned in the first tutorial, we are now going to take the same colours and techniques and go large. When you open up an A3 sketchbook...
Creating massive impact with minimal resources
Season#gmseasonoflessIn the previous lesson, we explored our colour palette and mark making. Now we'll be bringing it all together. Action Steps pull everything together in a...
Colour Mixing
Season#gmseasonoflessIn this tutorial learn how to explore the full possible range of a limited colour palette, and experiment with mark making. In the next lesson, we'll pull it...
Layers of Reflection
Reflection Reflection happens often for me, I define it as giving serious thought to something. That something usually involves a good measure of self-reflection too. For...
Silhouette Reflections
Reflection The end of the year is a good time to reflect on the past year and our hopes and dreams for the upcoming year. This tutorial will show you how to combine written...
Creating Everyday with Artist Trading Cards
Habit This lesson will take you through a week long creative habit that I like to do in my own art practice. For 6 days, we will set ourselves up to create an artist trading card...
Documenting the Roller Coaster
Documenting DEBBIE BAMBERGER Debbie is a sexual and reproductive health nurse practitioner in Berkeley, California. She began art journaling in 2016 with no prior art...
Floral Junk Journaling
Documenting In this lesson, you'll learn what junk journaling is and see examples of Meg's own junk journals. She'll show you how you can create your own floral inspired junk...
How to start: Taking ideas and lessons from other artists to put them in your journal
Starting Kelly Henson Kelly is a veritable mash up of mother, teacher, skater and newbie art journaler. In previous creative incarnations she has been a digital scrapbooker...
Re-start: Six practical ways to get back into journaling when you’ve taken a break
Starting Tanyalee Kahler Tanyalee Kahler is an Australian mum turned artist. She loves creating mixed media art journals, dabbling with watercolours, publishing magazines...
Release Your Inner Child: Finger Painting
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Expressing your current mood through a painted selfie
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Abstract Emotions
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Use it Up Journal
What do you do with your leftover paints? Or dirty stencils? Anouk uses them in my use it up journal, where she makes beautiful backgrounds of them which are ready for some quick and easy journaling sessions.
Stone textures: Juxtaposing texture and colour in your work
Freedom Elly here, closing the Season of Freedom and bringing you the very last tutorial from 2018’s Creative Team. I wanted to leave you with something colourful and fun that...
Bonus: Art Journaling Formulae for Busy People
This section will include 10 step-by-step formulae for making art journal spreads to take the overwhelm out of art journaling.
Lesson 5 – Prompts
How I interpret prompts and how I utilise the techniques I have demonstrated so far to make my pages. The goal is to give you a starting point for using prompts in your own pages. It will include a run-through of my interpretation of four prompts, with hopefully four very different spreads at the end.
Lesson 8 – Resisting Ink
In this lesson, we are looking at how to resist ink. Since ink is such a fluid and water like medium, it can be fun and interesting to pair it with something opposite. We will work with elements that are basic for any artist – nothing fancy, not even masking fluid!
Lesson 4 – Layering Image Transfers
For this final lesson, I will demonstrate how you can create a really cool art journal spread by layering multiple image transfers on top of one another. This particular process does take time to complete, only because you have to wait until each transfer is completely dry before you add another transfer over it. But the outcome is so worth the time and wait.
Lesson 2 – Intricate Backgrounds
In this lesson, I will show you how to create intricate backgrounds using paints, inks, and a series of image transfers. This is an easy way to make your pages pop and look like they took a great deal of work to create.
Lesson 3a – Acrylic
Blended acrylics, smoosh pages, gelli printing, inky drips, abstract stripes,
Part 1 – Spirit Animals
Why do you need a Spirit Animal? What is the point? Why can’t a quiz on Buzzfeed tell you the answer? A Spirit Animal embodies a trait or a quality that you have in your personality or that you would like to invite into your art journal. Take the time to meditate on this, try to focus on a part of you that you like – or something that you lack – and that you would want to symbolise through an animal. You give the meaning to that animal because it is your Spirit Animal.
Lesson 3 – Abstract Backgrounds
This lesson is broken up into three parts: acrylic backgrounds, watercolour backgrounds and collaged backgrounds. I will very quickly take you through a selection of techniques using each medium/technique. At the end of the lesson you will have a vast array of tricks up your sleeve to make fast, abstract backgrounds for your art journal spreads.
Lesson 5 – Real Life Pieces
Incorporating real life pieces into our journal pages – the things that accumulate in your life on their own accord; little mementos that come from events you attend, people you meet or places you visit.
Lesson 5 – Acrylic Galaxy
We’ve already made it to lesson 5 and in this lesson I am going to show you how I paint a galaxy using acrylic paint! This is a totally different medium than watercolors, and while watercolors are my personal favorite (I love how the flow and blend!), acrylics paint can make some really cool galaxies and they are often more vibrant and richer colors than watercolor paints
Lesson 6 – Peace
Tthoughts about the idea of inner peace and how we seek it.
How to Paint a Geometric Galaxy
I’ve gotten a bit of a reputation for including watercolor galaxies in my work, but I just can’t help it. I love painting galaxies and starry scenes, so now I am thrilled to be sharing my techniques with you.
Bonus – Marks Imitate Art
In this bonus lesson, we will create an art journal page transforming a found image with marks! This is a great technique to practice creating marks but also makes for a really lovely art journal page!
Lesson 6 – Unconventional Marks + Tools
Some of my favourite unconventional mark making tools I use in my journals.
Lesson 4 – Lines, Lines, Lines
Lines can be utilized in many different ways to create visual interest in your artwork. Lines can be used as a graphic element to create drama, help draw the viewers eye across the page to a point of interest, create backgrounds with controlled line work and more.
Lesson 1 – Mark Making Warm Ups
3 different warm up exercises designed to help you loosen up and also connect internally with your marks.
Flowers of Freedom with the Gelli Plate
Freedom Hello everyone! It’s TC here, with my final tutorial as part of the 2018 Creative Team. I can hardly tell you what a great year it’s been and how grateful I am to you for...
The Freedom to Get Inspired From Art History
Freedom Hi, it’s Moriah here and this is sadly my last tutorial for you all as a member of the Get Messy creative team. It’s been such a joy to serve on the team this year and I...
It’s Happening Now: Making Art Fast and Slow to Create a Page of Opposites
First we will work as fast as we possibly can, going wild on the page without stopping to think about what we are doing. Next, we will move to the opposite extreme and work incredibly slow, slower than we might have imagined possible. Lastly, we will bring these two extremes together to create a page of opposites, inspired by the principles of yin and yang.
Liberate yourself through abstract art (Perfectionism is an illusion)
Freedom Ali Ali Brown is a wife, mother, teacher, intercessor, singer, musician, photographer, filmographer and artist. She is a life scribe who has kept a journal for as...
Playing with Masks: Using Masking with Acrylic Mediums to Create Layered Spreads
Freedom Happy Wednesday Messians! Tiffany here with an interesting way to play with your acrylic paints and inks. In this tutorial I'll show you a few ways to play around with...
Hand Lettering Bold Statements
Freedom Hello! Alicia here from Vine & Thistle. In my last tutorial as a part of the Get Messy Creative Team, I am going to be showing you how to create a bright and bold...
Colour Theory Basics: The Colour Wheel and Colour Harmony
Ubuntu KELLEE Kellee Wynne Conrad is the creator of Color Crush Creative, a thriving, internationally followed Instagram community of color loving artists and the online...
One World – A Mixed Media Concertina Art Journal
Ubuntu Basic Supplies: Large sheet of smooth medium weight paper like Arches hot press - 22”x30” 90lb/185gsm Fluid paints in favorite colors like Golden Fluid Acrylic Paint Brayer...
Art Joy Postcards – Share and Care With a Card
Ubuntu Hi Messians, this is Clare with a super versatile tutorial for the season of Ubuntu. What better way to share some joy with family and friends near and far than by...
Liven Up Your Creative Palette!
Seasons In this video, I explain three simple principles of color to liven up your creative palettes: color value, temperature and intensity. Use these tips to make your...
Acrylic Painting Techniques Tutorial
Seasons In this video, I share three fun acrylic painting techniques to create painted patterns in your journal. We’ll walk through dry brush stripes, rose florals, and an ombre...
Leaf and flower gelli prints for all seasons
How to use fresh leaves and flowers to create beautiful gelli prints for your journals.
Creating a Seasonal Mood Board
We all have favorite seasonal activities and traditions. By using old calendar pages, and creating a mood board, we are celebrating these unique parts of the current and upcoming seasons.
Repeat patterns: creating decorative designs in your art journal
This tutorial will guide you and inspire you to create repeat patterns in your art journal and on collage papers for your art journal.
Let’s Get Fancy: Taking collage further with your Gelli Plate
Artist Julia Bethmann shows you use your gelli plate to get more out of your collage work.
Archetypes enhance the power of story: using the hero’s journey in our art
Archetypes are used in stories to convey powerful meaning across culture and time. Explore the classic archetype of the Hero and the Hero’s Journey in our art journals using mixed media elements and a recurring Hero figure.
Storyboard Sunday: Using comic book panels to tell your tale
Comic book panels are a great way to focus in on the small moments while, at the same time, building up a bigger picture of the story we want to tell. In this tutorial, we’re going to be telling our stories by combining a comic book page layout with a mixed media, art journaling style.
Layers and Layers of Life with Cindy
In this Artist Date with Cindy, we will glue and paint and then gesso and then glue and then paint some more. And then maybe some more.
Mindful Art with Amy
Amy from Mindful Art Studio demonstrates using art for mindfulness in order to find beauty and relaxation.
Documenting Color with Sarah
Create color swatches to cut apart to make simple collage palettes and patterns with Sarah.
Selfie Sketch: Creating a painted sketched self portrait of yourself
Tiffany shows you a different way to create a self portrait using a headshot photo of yourself.
Make Your Own Collage Papers using a Gelli Plate
Helpful tips for beginning gelli plate users to feel comfortable.
Telling unconventional stories through abstract art
In this post, we will be thinking about unconventional stories and making abstract art to represent a different way of thinking about the unconventional stories that are important to us.
Create texture in your art journal using minimal supplies
This tutorial will show you two different ways of creating texture in your art journal using minimal supplies, making it the perfect beginners technique.
Junk drawer as treasure trove: using household items to make marks in your journal
Use common household items — things from your cupboards, drawers, and mail piles — to make marks in your art journal.
Scavenger Hunt: Get inspired by your neighborhood
Today I invite you to explore your neighborhood or maybe even a new city as a child would, curious about everything and wanting to find all the answers! Use the scavenger hunt guide to collect inspiration for your art journal and let your inner child play.
The paintbrush of power: Using comics and cartoons to turn yourself into a superhero
When I read all our posts and conversations on the Facebook group or on the forums, I am continually blown away by the incredible human beings that make up this community. I see courage, creativity, friendliness, and love. I see artists making the world a better place each and every day. Lets play at being superheroes, celebrating these incredible qualities and bringing them to life in our art.
Scribble Play: Creating a mixed media mosaic scribble
Have fun creating and filling in a giant scribble with all sorts of materials and mediums you don’t normally work with to create a quirky mixed media mosaic scribble.
Level up your art by drawing into wet paint
Artist Cait Sherwood shows you a really simple technique for leveling up your art. Draw into wet paint and create a deeper art journal page.
Seeing patterns: Carve your own rotating stamp
Using a square eraser you will learn to easily design and carve a stamp that creates a rotating pattern. Create your own designs or be inspired by your personal symbols or images you find in a book. Using a stamp to create patterns, is a quick way to add a layer of interest to your spreads.
Roll the art dice: a creative art journaling game
Play Download the List Save this file to your computer, print it out, and keep it inside your journal to spark journal ideas. Hello artists, Alicia here to kick off the Season of...
Everyday kindness: flaps which open to reveal inspiration for ordinary kindness
Kindness Hi everybody! This is TC, and I'm super happy to be with you today! I love this season and I'm looking forward to all the messes we're going to make together this year....
Self-love: How to create an origami love letter to yourself
Kindness Hi, it’s Moriah and I am so excited to share my tutorial with you today! For the season of kindness I wanted to find a way to express self love. Being kind to myself is...
Knitted with love: Using yarn to create pattern and texture
When I was thinking about the theme of kindness, I thought about how much love and care gets poured into making things by hand for the people we love – baking a cake, sewing a dress, knitting a sweater. The end result is a form of kindness that you can feel, that has been brought to life through the process of making something by hand.
2.1 Quiet Backgrounds
how to quieten a background with gesso
how to quieten a background with vellum
how to quieten a background with tissue paper
how to quieten a background with white out text
the glory of the blank page
inherently quiet backgrounds
2.2 Abstract Acrylic
a super easy way to paint abstractly with paint
how to keep abstract painting minimalist
2.3 Riet Poch – Depth in Backgrounds
In a minimalistic page you can’t have a busy background, a lot of writing and a lot of other elements. That doesn’t mean that you aren’t allowed to use more than one color or element, but before you start decide what your focus will be. The focus in this lesson will be on the background. With simple techniques we’ll create detailed bases for our message.
Playful Printmaking
Kindness Hello Get Messy Family! I am thrilled to share one of my favorite art journaling techniques with you. This is one that I find easy to do, inexpensive, great for all...
Healing Heart: Using painted paper and collage to encourage self love
Kindness Hi, Sarah here! I'm so excited to share this tutorial with you all! I love that we're starting a new year of Get Messy with the Season of Kindness. What a great way to...
Spreading kindness: Using our art journals to leave kind words for others
Kindness Hello artists, Alicia here to share with you a special tutorial that is near and dear to me! When I lived in New York City, it became a habit of mine to take in all the...
Creating a journal of the tides of your year
Nature Hi Get Messy friends. It's Elizabeth here with my final tutorial of the year. And what a year it has been. I have been so grateful to connect with you, and have been so...
Block printing nature motifs
Nature
Translating Music to Paper
Nature Hey friends. For todays post I wanted to show you something that I absolutely love doing in my journal. And that is, making playlists or working with...
How to journal with leaves
Nature Hi Messians! Today I am going to share with you some ideas on how to get nature directly into our art journals. I have used different types of leaves for all of my...
How to paint an acrylic greenhouse
Connections We're in awe of Julie and her magical art. Obviously her hand-painted floral necklaces speak directly to Caylee's soul. As does her new podcast about her studio...
How to make an envelope journal
Connections Hey y'all! It's Katie here with my tutorial for the Season of Connections! Have you ever had a penpal? I used to have half a dozen of them when I was a...
Creating a mixed media self portrait
Connections "A portrait affirms; it gives the gift of self to its subject. It says, 'Yes, you are worth spending this time over, your story deserves to be told, you should...
Imagining and creating fantastic creatures in your art journal
Fairy Tales Hello Messians, it's EmK again, and I am thrilled to be here for the season that I've been anticipating the most: Fairy Tales! I've always fancied myself a writer...
Making paint brushes from found objects
Fairy Tales ‘Proper’ paint brushes are amazing of course, but sometimes it’s nice to go a little off-piste and put some of nature’s tools to use – especially at this time of...