Messy May No 5

Messy Collaboration

We call ourselves Messians. We’ve held solo and group gallery shows, published books, been in magazines and actual newspapers, created online art schools (and art communities of our own), been featured by Instagram, led retreats, sold our art, collaborated with other artists, quit our job for art, and taught art live.

Mainly, we’ve created a LOT of art.

Julia Cusworth

Julia is a UK-based mixed media abstract artist and designer inspired by colour, movement, and nature. Her work is unapologetic, expressive, and full of life—created with the belief that creativity lives in everyone.

Elly McComb

Elly is an illustrator and artist living in Australia. She's inspired by stories and fantasy and the natural world. As a trinket hoarding goblin, Elly shares her work as stickers and pretty paper loot on Patreon and her website. As an oil painting tree lover, Elly sells her work through online platforms and art fairs. All of her creative work, big and small, is driven by her work in journals. 

Alyssa Griese

Living in Canada, with a BA in visual arts, Alyssa is a maker and lover of all things handmade. For Alyssa, embracing imperfections and chasing after “happy accidents” is the true magic of art journaling. Anything goes within the pages of her art journal and it has become an important place for her to process, to experiment and to play.

Michelle Schratz

Michelle is a mixed media artist with a strong passion for art journaling

Anouk Karssen

Anouk is an all-round creative from the Netherlands. For Anouk art journaling is a way to process her thoughts and emotions. In her creative journey Anouk tries to let go of her perfectionism by creating on a more intuitive level.

Caylee Grey

Hyperbolic journaler and imperfect artist, Caylee Grey is also a wife and mother from South Africa. Caylee is the Fairy Artmother of the Get Messy art journal community, book, and art supplies brand. She has sworn an oath to embrace the messy middle and believes that more than zero is enough.

Sarah Rondon

Sarah is an artist and maker working with her hands - collage, jewelry, and quiet, tactile processes. She is drawn to texture, found materials, and the small rituals of creating.

Meg

Meg is a twenty-something art and junk journal lover who is obsessed with florals. She hosts the month-long prompt challenges #JunkJournalJanuary and #JunkJournalJuly on Instagram. She loves reading, cats, crochet, and a nice cup of tea.

Caroline Hiscock

Caroline is an Art Witch who firmly believes that art is a tool for healing and self-knowledge. They also believe in the power of finding the magic in the mundane…and of setting that down on paper. Caroline’s work is rooted in blending color, symbolism and wonder.

Sarah Gardner

Sarah Gardner, also known as Juicy*S of Juicy*S Art, is a self-taught mixed media artist and teacher.  She’s been teaching online since 2020, starting with Everything Art’s Wanderlust. She’s also been a teacher for Willa Workshops, Get Messy, Create Arts Online, One Badass Art Journal, and has her own Teachable learning platform: Juicy*S Mixed Media Art School. She’s been published in Strawberry Moon Magazine, featured in Kasia Avery’s “Creative Wanderlust,” and is the author of “Share Your Joy: Mixed Media Shareable Art.” Creativity is self-care for Sarah because playing with her art supplies in a curious and intuitive way allows her to banish her perfectionistic inner critic, and connect with her truest self. She has come to learn that it is this process, not the perfect end result, that brings her joy. A new art journaling course: “Layer ’til You Like it,” will launch soon in Sarah’s Teachable School. You can learn more at her website: https://www.juicy-s.net/

Meghann Early

Meghann is an NYC Based mixed media and collage artist & tarot reader. She loves to experiment with unconventional materials and believes that art making is for everyone.

Karina America

Karina is a licensed therapist and a creative seeker. She loves to interweave the intersection of art, soul and the divine feminine. 

Jessy Kaschig

Jessy is a European mixed media artist and lifelong creative who believes in living a life of abundance and possibility. Creativity has always been a natural part of how she experiences the world. Deeply connected to words, colours and reflection, she practices journaling in many forms - including diary, art, nature, junk, and faith journaling - each offering a unique way to explore life and express herself.

Her approach is rooted in “progress over perfection.” In her work, creative flow becomes a form of mindfulness, while mixed media offers a sense of freedom and openness.

Diana Mahar

Diana Mahar is a mixed-media artist, bookbinder and educator who discovered joy and flow in art journaling. This low-stakes, forgiving practice brought much-needed balance to her work life as a physician. She loves experimenting with found materials and is continually inspired by the lifelong learning that comes from a creative practice. She lives and works in Northern California.

Casey Turner

Casey is a self taught mixed media artist who fell in love with art journaling as a healthy outlet for releasing emotion during a time of grieving in her life. She enjoys teaching others how to art journal as well as how to incorporate their faith into their creative practice. She teaches classes online and hosts Christian art journaling retreats around the Unites States. She has taught for courses like Wanderlust, Get Messy, Flowers Magic Art Fest and more. She lives in the peaceful countryside of a tiny little no where town in Pennsylvania with her husband and children. 

Vanessa Oliver-Lloyd

Vanessa is a Canadian artist living abroad. She creates spaces for like-minded creatives to explore archetypes, art witchery and the self. Using her knowledge from her work as an archaeologist, she leads communal spaces to explore art and dig deep into ourselves at the same time.

Tania Ahmed

Tania Ahmed is a UK based mixed media artist, art journaler and self-confessed serial gel printer. Born in Pakistan and now rooted in England, she draws inspiration from cultural motifs, bold patterns and personal symbolism, weaving them into layered pages and soulful prints.
Her teaching style is warm, a little chatty and equal parts technique and tough love: helping students let go of perfection-itis and remember that practice makes progress.
Her work is an invitation to make art that feels like you: imperfect, vibrant, alive and always evolving.

Lauren Fisher

Lauren is a multi-passionate creatrix based in the foothills of the leafy Dandenong Ranges in the outer east of Melbourne, Australia. She is an arts psychotherapist (aka creative arts therapist), clinical counsellor, creative community group facilitator, mixed-media artist, art witch, dancer and former portrait photographer. Her art journal creations are often colourful, eclectic and sometimes an absurd mix of imagery, sensuous textures, words and abstract shapes that embrace the shadow and light aspects of everyday life.

Amanda Trought

London-born Amanda is a Mixed Media Artist whose work has been exhibited globally, earning her numerous awards for her sculptural art and textile wall hangings. Her art has been featured in several publications and explores the use of art and creativity and its impact on health and well-being. In addition to her artistic practice, Amanda teaches both off and online and shares the use of developing an art journaling and creative practice. She curates an Arts in Health Network, and shares her expertise through podcasts, YouTube, and writing, inspiring others in the process.

Debasree Dey

Debasree Dey is an intuitive mixed media artist and educator, known for her love of textures, layers and vintage-inspired, earthy colour palettes. A former IT engineer, she left the IT corporate world to follow a more tactile and expressive creative path. 

Collage is an important part of Debasree’s practice. She works with layered papers along with fabrics and stitched elements to add depth and texture to her art journals and mixed-media pieces.

Inspired by nature, travel, and everyday surfaces, her work reflects a slowing down and a willingness to let materials lead. Since 2016, Debasree has taught nearly 20,000 students worldwide, encouraging artists to trust their intuition, work with what they have, and create fearlessly.

Jackie Hernandez

Jackie Hernandez is a watercolor, collage, and mixed media artist. She is the creator of The Mark Making Starter Kit, which guides artists to explore their unique shape language. On YouTube, Jackie shares low-pressure watercolor and mark making tutorials to encourage others to develop a regular creative practice.

Claire Stead

Claire Stead, also known as Art Journal Love, lives in the UK - in Derbyshire, in the beautiful Peak District with her husband and family. She discovered Mixed media Art Journaling years ago and has been totally swept up by it! She art journals for mental wellbeing and to share the joy that art journaling can bring.

Miranda van den Heuvel

Miranda is an artist, writer, and speaker who explores the quiet magic of creative living. Through daily art journaling, she draws inspiration from nature, travel, and the rhythms of everyday life, sharing both her work and reflections with a growing online community.
Her creative process is intuitive and open-ended - beginning without a fixed plan, guided instead by gentle structure and a spirit of play. Layer by layer, words, images, and textures emerge, transforming thoughts and emotions into something tangible. For Miranda, creativity is not just expression, but discovery.
Her work reflects a deep belief in the parallels between art and life: both are shaped through uncertainty, revision, and persistence. Art journaling, in particular, has been a steady anchor, especially during years of illness, offering a safe space for honesty, healing, and self-exploration.
Through her paintings, writing, and talks, Miranda invites others to embrace the process, trust their intuition, and find meaning in the unfolding.

Amanda Hawkins

Amanda is an Arizona-based artist, designer, website maker, and member of the band Rushmore Beekeepers. Her abstract paintings evoke otherworldly, textured landscapes built through layers of acrylic paint, pencils, and markers.

Emma Freeman

Emma Freeman is a contemplative and joyful mixed media artist and teacher based in Wisconsin in the United States. She loves creating small books, scrolls and wall hangings out of old textiles, slow stitching, collage, gathered nature, evocative words and gorgeous paints. Her work is full of emotion, beauty and meaning. Her art practice is rooted in mindfulness, healing touch, deep presence and passionate curiosity. Making art has supported her well-being and mental health in many ways throughout her life including to recover from addiction and work through trauma, anxiety and grief. Emma teaches classes and retreats online and in person around the United States. You can learn more about her at www.emmafreemanartist.com. 

Michelle Tasker

Shelle is a self taught, mixed media artist from the UK. Her art focuses on play and exploration and she loves to use found objects, bits of nature and thrifted items. Shes in her element when she’s surrounded by her art supplies and some weird treasures she’s found. 

Marusha Mozolevskaya

Marusha is the founder of Girls Who Write – a global platform and community supporting women who want to find joy in writing, develop their voice, and take their ideas seriously, whether for the first time or the next chapter. She works as a book writing mentor and journaling guide, helping writers and writers-to-be move from self-doubt to structure, clarity, and finished work.
She is the author of Not Just a Mom, a memoir-based self-help book for all the art moms out there, creator of the Naked Words journaling course, and the founder of the annual Barcelona Journaling Festival – and the upcoming New York Journaling Festival. Marusha is based in Barcelona, where she lives with her 12-year old son Keith and a little brown dog Fika.