When an Art Journal Page Goes Wrong: My Struggle with Purple

I don't love every art journal page I make. 

This one in particular was a struggle. I was trying to work with purple - a colour I regularly tell myself I should use more - and almost everything I did seemed to make the page worse.

But I kept going ...

Not because I suddenly fell in love with the page, but because sometimes the value of a creative project isn't the finished result. It's what you learn while you're trying to rescue it.

“Growth is not linear. It's a beautiful, messy place.”

That quote feels particularly appropriate for this page. While you don't always have to share a finished art journal page, as a creative who does share her work, I think it's important to show the 'naff' alongside the good!

Embracing a colour I don't love

I struggle with the colour purple but every now and then I tell myself to put on my "big girl knickers" and create using it!

I'm not really sure why I find purple so difficult, especially as blue is one of my favourite colours. Perhaps it's the particular shades I choose, or maybe I simply don't naturally see purple in the same way I see other colours.

For this page, I laid down quite a lot of purple in the background and, to be honest, it quickly became too much.

No amount of water or masking seemed to take away how strongly the colour was dominating the page. My first thought was to break up that mass of colour by stamping over it, keeping to the same colours - Seedless Preserves and Villainous Potion Distress Oxide inks.

It helped break up the solid block of colour, but I still wasn't happy. The purple was dominating the page and the stamped elements weren't doing enough to balance it.

So I tried adding more stamping, this time using Versafine Clair Nocturne. The darker stamping gave the page some much-needed definition. The individual elements began to stand apart from the background rather than disappearing into it.

Sometimes you need to step back ...

On a separate piece of mixed media card, I stamped the main image from my Blooming Circles design along with some of the smaller elements. I cut these out and started arranging them on the page.

I always do a "dry run" before sticking anything down. It gives me the chance to move elements around, change the balance and, importantly, decide whether I actually like what I'm doing before reaching for the glue.

And I didn't.

Too much of that strong purple background was still visible around the stamped elements, and the page didn't feel balanced.

At this point, I was finally getting somewhere.

Not necessarily somewhere I had planned to go - but somewhere that felt better than where I'd started.

What this page reminded me

Creative growth rarely happens in a straight line.

I started with an idea in my head, and the reality on the page looked nothing like it. The background was too strong, the composition wasn't working and I kept trying things that didn't quite solve the problem.

I walked away from it more than once. Each time I came back, I could see something slightly differently. Eventually, I stopped trying to make the page into what I'd originally imagined and started working with what was actually there.

And I think that's the bit of the process that matters.

What did I learn?

I still don't like purple.

There, that's settled!

But I did learn that not liking the result doesn't necessarily mean the page has failed. I actually like the composition I ended up with, even though the purple still isn't a colour I'd naturally reach for.

More importantly, I didn't abandon the page when it started going wrong. I experimented, walked away, came back and tried something else. Sometimes that's the real win.

Do you have a colour you struggle with?

Is there a colour that, whatever you make, never seems to look quite right when you've finished?

I'd love to know what colour that is for you. We all have those shades that somehow seem to misbehave every time we use them!

And perhaps, like me, you might find that using a colour you don't particularly like is actually a useful creative challenge.

Until next time, take care,

Lou
xxx

Supplies used

• Pink Pig art journal
• Distress Oxide Ink – Seedless Preserves
• Distress Oxide Ink – Villainous Potion
• Distress Oxide Ink – Wild Honey
• Versafine Clair Nocturne
• Blooming Circles stamp set
• Oh So Circular stamp set
• Coloured pencils
• Mixed media card