I can trace my renewed interest in art journaling/altered book projects back to my participation, first, in ICAD 2016, then, my ongoing continued participation in the Daisy Yellow group. A heartfelt shout out of thanks to Tammy Garcia for her tireless work, promotion and gentle guidance.
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| the second spread from Love Songs |
Jerome, A Froggy ABCdarium, builds on the new work i started in Love Songs. In Love Songs, i made a deliberate decision to 'foreground' the figures from the original imagery; cutting around them to allow a new collage to build up behind and around them. Since all of the illustrations were framed it was an easy choice to build the text top and bottom.
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| page 1, A, 8.25.17, With the Help of Henri... |
For Jerome i added a couple of new elements into the design mix. Structurally Jerome is an ABCdarium, an alphabet book, i am using parts of the original text of the story, as well as 'found' text about each letter to develop a re-contextualized narrative. I am building each of the spreads around an element of the original imagery, usually the figure of Jerome.
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| page 2, B, 8.27.17, Waiting Beyond.... |
This journal is laid out so almost every letter has a double spread. The original book, Jerome, is a hard bound children's book from 1967(10.25 x 7.5") featuring a frog that wants to be a prince. The story is charming, the illustrations, rather psychedelic. Structurally my intention is to preserve the illustrations of the frog, building the collages around him, while maintaining some sort of narrative(however surreal) while proceeding through the alphabet. Unless otherwise noted, hand cut collage with found text.
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| page 3, C, 8.28.17,Common Sense |
In this, the first appearance of Jerome, you see an unassuming, small frog. His appearance changes as he starts to realize his objectives.
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| page 4 D,, 8.29.17, She Hates.... |
In this spread Jerome, although still at his pond is assuming a larger, more central figure; his text,'Hello old witch' is part of the narrative of this page. The witch, unhappy about being called an old witch decides to turn him into something ugly. He ends up a prince.
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| page 5, E, 9.1.17, An Epic Desire.... |
In this spread Jerome, questions his 'prince-ness' ; his text,'am i.... I don't...' is part of the original narrative of this page. Technically one of the pages of each spread gets cut into, cut away, allowing parts of the 'backs' of the preceding page/collage to be yet another further back layer of the final imagery.
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| page 6, F, 9.2.17, A Few Words.... |
In this spread Jerome, presents himself in a positive light, declaring his princely stature. The finger pointing of the right side practically created itself; i knew yesterday, (almost un-heard) in part how this narrative and imagery would go. Technically one of the pages of each spread gets cut into, cut away, allowing parts of the 'backs' of the preceding page/collage to be yet another further back layer of the final imagery.
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| page 7, G, 9.6.17, The Girls.... |
This spread proved to be particularly problematic; my own fault, as i completely forgot to pay attention to where the image of Jerome fell on the back of the page i was working on. Since there was a completed collage where i wanted to cut i had to find another work around. Technically one of the pages of each spread gets cut into, cut away, allowing parts of the 'backs' of the preceding page/collage to be yet another further back layer of the final imagery. Oops!
It actually took three days of work to finish this spread to my satisfaction. Probably a little to long, but hey, what else do i have to do but watch endless weather updates regarding Irma; i mean, after all, i do live on a boat.
More later,
gail
