Finally, the Journals Section is Alive
I finally got off my fat ass and started putting my journals on here—actually, I had to be on my ass to do it. I kept putting it off because it involves scanning hundreds of pages and then editing the images. I have about a quarter of Journal #1: The Adirondack Journal scanned, edited, and uploaded to this site for your viewing pleasure. If I make that pot of coffee I’ve been thinking about for the past hour, I may have the entire thing up by morning. Journal #6, the one I’m currently working on, is on here too. I’ll be putting more pages from it on here as I finish them.
I hate using the words “journals” and “journaling” because they sound… well, sogay. It reminds of some teenage girl writing about how no one understands her or about some boy she fancies. I could use “scrapbooks” and “scrapbooking”. That isn’t any better. I picture some grey-haired woman pasting pictures of cats or dried leaves in a book that has the word “memories” written in yarn on the cover. Alas, I’ve never been able to come up with anything else. It’s irrelevant anyway. I’m not going to let semantics keep me from doing something.
I first started making journals after I purchased the book Ports of Entry: William S. Burroughs and the Arts and saw William S. Burroughs’ scrapbooks. I was quite familiar with his writing and recordings, but had seen little of his artwork and none of his amazing scrapbooks. Ports of Entry was the catalog for a Los Angeles County Museum of Art exhibit of Burroughs’ work (I’d cut off my pinky to see a show like that). I was surprised that he made such a vast amount of artwork. Another Burroughs idea I tried (to steal) was shotgun painting. I attached a few bags of paint to a piece of plywood and fired at it. A piece of shot ricocheted off the wood and nicked the top of my father’s head. That was the end of that. Not my father; he was fine.
Then there’s The 1000 Journals Project. It’s a really cool idea. Someguy (that’s his name) started it in San Francisco by leaving blank journals in public places. They had instructions that said to do something in the book, give it to someone else, and send it back to Someguy when it was full. Later on, he created a website where you could signup for journals. Only one journal has been returned since the project started in 2000. There’s a book out now and a film coming soon.
It was difficult to signup for one because he didn’t release them very often and a lot of people wanted them. After a week of obsessively visiting the website (I’m very persistent), I was lucky enough to signup for a journal. I received it a few weeks later, did my thing in it, gave it to a friend and my professor to do their respective things, and sent it on its way. I’m still in line for three other journals. It’s been five years. As optimistic as I am (being not at all), I don’t expect to receive them. But, I am a patient boy and I can wait.
Two years ago, during my usual nighttime book perusal at Borders, I found Altered Books, Collaborative Journals, and Other Adventures in Bookmaking and it had a chapter on The 1000 Journals Project. To my surprise, a couple of the journal pages I did were in the book. Last year, someone contacted me about interviewing me about my experience in the project and journaling in general. Sadly, it didn’t work out. However, both incidents titillated my ego (probably still do or I wouldn’t be telling you now).
1 Comment
Eva Deadbeat said 641 days ago:
Journals look good and are cool projects (screw the semantics you teenage girl/aging scrapbooker). Good job getting em scanned!
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