Book Guild - Chapter 1

Welcome to the fourth edition of The Pulse -- The State of the Art -- a survey in words and pictures of the online artist community. Nearly 150 artists have answered a list of questions which make up The Pulse. Their responses will be presented as a series of online and print projects. Secret Sunday was the first project and the links to all the secrets can be found on the sidebar of my blog. The Book Guild is the second project and begins right now!


All artists participating in The Pulse were asked to name their favorite art books. The Book Guild will present this list, along with links, book reviews, giveaways, and interviews with many of your favorite authors. And as members of The Guild, I am hoping YOU will participate by leaving comments related to the books in each post - for example thoughts, book reviews, personal experiences, or a link back to your own blog posts that include artwork based on a project in the listed book.

To celebrate both the opening of The Guild and my 200,000 visit, I have been holding a giveaway of 5 art books. And today, 5 lucky people who were randomly picked will each add 1 art book to their personal library. Thanks to everybody who played - all 289 of you!

And the books go to:

Sheila from Halo Hill has won Journal Spilling: Mixed-Media Techniques for Free Expression by Diana Trout

Robert on Absolute Arts has won Printmaking + Mixed Media: simple techniques and projects for paper and fabric by Dorit Elisha

Nicole (nicowat) from My Life in Pictures has won Collage Unleashed by Traci Bautista

Bill from Billzetti's World has won Cover to Cover: Creative Techniques for Making Beautiful Books, Journals & Albums by Shereen LaPlantz

Peggy from Out of Hand has won What It Is by Lynda Barry

Congratulations to all of you. Please email me with your address so that I can mail out the books to you. And for those of you who did not win, no worries...there will be more giveaways on The Guild soon.

Of the 5 books I included, Diana Trout's book Journal Spilling was the most frequently requested in the giveaway.



And I am happy to be able to announce that she is our guest author for the first meeting of The Book Guild. So gather around, pull up a chair, and let me introduce you to... Diana Trout:

Spilling My Heart Out

Fall 2007

North Light: Would you be interested in writing a book about art journaling?

Me: Hopping in my socks (after my shoes were blown across the room) YES!

The premise of Journal Spilling came about in a very organic way. That is the way I work: just by starting and letting everything spill out until I get to the heart of it, that little nugget of truth that needs to be in the high beams. The six months before the photoshoot, was spent in the process of making the art and coming up with the projects: stretching and challenging myself. I kinda did what I always do: moodle around with materials until an idea begins to emerge then jump on that galloping horse and make the art (except times 10!).

Since I work with very little planning, this was a sticky bit for me because I needed to remember to record what I was doing without interrupting the flow of ideas. My inner engineer (aka Stewie) came up with a couple of systems to help me with this part. Sticky notes really are brilliant!

I was pretty nervous going out to Ohio for the photoshoot, but it was a blast. My editor and the photographer were so professional and friendly. What a great team, full of thoughts, observations and ideas. I felt really comfortable with them and all the folks at F&W. It was definitely weird though having people watch me work and take notes. Yikes.

Our beloved Phillies won the World Series in 2008 while I was at that photoshoot. There I was in my hotel room, screaming into a pillow while everyone here at home was dancing in the streets. If you look on page 100 you’ll see the sports section from the day after the big win as table protection under my artwork. (Go Phils.)

The last step was the most challenging to me. After receiving the mock-up from the photoshoot, I was on the home stretch: the writing. I really wanted to invite the reader into my classroom. Crafting each sentence, choosing each word, asking myself the same questions over and over again:
Who are my readers? Where are they coming from? What may they need to hear?

You see, it needed to be real. It needed to be honest. My mission was to give my readers the freedom to make their own art; to use the techniques and projects in Journal Spilling as a springboard. It was pretty much a six week writing marathon.

Fall 2009

The final form of Journal Spilling was hearing from folks that they love the tone, projects and inspiration of Journal Spilling. That they needed a little push, and they got it from this book. Mission: accomplished as well as we could at that moment in time. The gallon or two of sweat along the way was worth every drop.

Thanks Diana for spilling out your heart to all of us, in both your book and in this post. Journal Spilling can be purchased here . And you can visit Diana on her website, on her blog, or at her Etsy shop.

As members of The Book Guild, I hope you will comment on this post to get the conversation going. Feel free to talk about Journal Spilling if you have a copy. And if you have created any journal pages or artwork based on Diana's book projects, please leave a link in the comments so we can all see.

Next meeting of The Book Guild - Sunday April 4th. Mark your calendars!