A journal. A space filled with insightful ideas, wild fantasies, anxious thoughts, secret notes, non-sense scribbles and even random doodles created out of boredom. These collections of Lynda Barry's journal pages caught my eyes as I was flicking through a book called Drawing From Life - The Journal as Art. Out of hundreds of journal pictures on the book, something really stood up from her page. Sure there are better journals than hers; ones that are really neat, well-constructed and full of detailed pictures but somehow I relate better to hers.
It's her randomness, her honesty and her unique perspective of the world emblazoned all over her journal pages which make her journal an amazing work to me. She said in the book that "whenever an errant thought gets stuck in her head, disrupting her work flow, she writes it in the journal." The scribbles, the doodles on her journal are simply her random observations or thoughts about things that happen around her. It maybe just small things like seeing birds flying to the north or feelings what she felt at the moment, but to me she is a brave person to just jot down all of them. To be random takes courage for some people, but to those who are brave enough to just be who they are and not try so hard to impress anyone else, they are being attractive just being themselves. She takes pride in her work no matter how meaningful or how useful it is. That's what I see from her journal which I find very interesting.
I also find it interesting that Lynda dares herself to be creative in her own way. She mentioned that her journal used to be not more than complaints and pissed-off handwriting but since she tried using Asian-style brush to create slow strokes of words and pictures, Lynda gains more satisfaction with her journal artwork. Now, that is one creative & productive way to sort yourself out, isn't it?
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