I've kept a journal pretty regularly, or regularly written of personal things, for almost all my life. In the last couple of years, I've tinkered with visual expression: sketching, painting. The largest thing that has kept me from exploring art further has been a fear of imperfection. Making a mistake. Doing something that looks stupid.
Somewhere, I broke through some mental barrier and I feel much braver and confident to try things. This doesn't mean I may be eager to show what I create online, but I am already heartened by the amount of art that is shared online. And that art is often very personal, not perfect, but full of meaning and significance. The presence of that work on the web is another influence on my growing confidence.
Recently, I found myself in the art section of Barnes & Nobel and I left with a copy of 1000 Journals Project by Someguy and Kevin Kelly. The book is an amazing glimpse into an ambitious project to connect the journal writings of hundreds and thousands of people. Basically, 1000 blank journals were given graphically appealing covers and an explanation of their purpose was written on or in them. They were sent randomly to individuals around the country, continent, world, with the simple instruction to use the journal as they pleased, and then to pass it along to someone else, by any means necessary. For some, this meant mailing them to other people. Others simply passed the journals to strangers on the street. Some laid the journal down on tables, benches, subway cars, to wait for the next person to pick them up, read the instructions and keep the book rolling.
What the project developers did not expect was how this experiment with collective creativity would grow into the virtual world online. Book-finders began to share their contributions or findings within the journals by scanning the pages and sending the images to the originators, who then compiled and shared them with the rest of the world via the web. Journal meets world. More about this project can be found here: http://www.1000journals.com/
That initial project is still underway, as long as any of the original 1000 books are still floating around. Recognizing that so many individuals were inspired and intrigued by the concept, they offered a second experiment: the 1001 journal project. This 1001st journal is the online community of journalists, diarists, memoir writers, visual journalists, and reflective artists who choose to continue the collective creativity humming by willing sharing their journals online. This continuation of the initial project can be found here: http://1001journals.com/
I've registered as a member of the 1001 community, but have not yet shared anything personal. I'm still working on the first pages of my first visual journal. But already I feel a sense of release and accomplishment. It is nice to have something to look forward to working on for an extended time. And this visual journal is something that will define itself over time.
Perhaps I will begin a second one with the express purpose of documenting family history and photography. It may take the form of a mixed media collage book. But right now, I'm most invested in the creation of a deeply personal book that combines words, images, colors, and mixed media to express my experience of life. There will be things that I feel confident sharing. And some things that will remain in the book, on my table, unshared.
My goal for this blog is to provide a place to organize my inspirations and what I choose to share in a space that models the book in the world: the blog on the web. It could be picked up and opened by anyone. Read or ignored. Perhaps something here will be worth someone's while and they'll stay long enough to follow one of my inspirations to their own creative spark. In the magical world of the web, I can mention an inspiration and one click is all that separates a reader/viewer from seeing that image. Cross-references do not require tracking down another book, but only following the hyperlinked web that creates a single "document" online. The multiple layers and dimensions and tangents that a web space makes possible is perfect for the way that my mind works, how the physical body encounters stimuli and sparks the beginning of the creative process, a process that is rarely linear.
And so, my physical journal / experience meets the world / collective via the nonlinear / hyperlinked / multilayered Internet.