Exploring embedding!

The journal prompt on embedding and superimposing has been the most rewarding for me so far. (I also created entries in response to the prompts on random stimulation and color exploration, and those posts are forthcoming.) The image above is an example of how I began this entry, using forms cut from black paper, and momentarily I'll explain what I did and how it worked out.

But first I want to mention that this week I really thought a lot about the process and purpose of making exploratory journal entries. As I mentioned in response to some helpful feedback I received on the Bb discussion board, it is really hard for me, as an illustrator, to set aside my results-driven approach to making work. When I'm making images, two questions are always in my mind: what will this will be used for? and who are my clients/audience? But I realize that these questions do not serve the same purposes in making a journal, so I really tried this week to create journal entries that are purposefully incomplete -- in process -- exploratory.

To create an entry that considers the possibilities of embedding* and superimposing, I cut out about ten forms from black paper. Some of the forms are ones associated with my journal theme -- my pregnancy -- and a few were more intuitive, freehand, and abstract. The uterus (above) is the most literal one. Below is the full set of original forms, without any superimposing.



















Then I spent some time exploring how the forms could be layered and superimposed to create new forms with different meanings (or, if not "meanings," then at least different feelings -- very subjective, I know). I really couldn't have predicted how interesting and satisfying I was going to find this process, but it was weirdly liberating to just piece these forms together with no real plan -- just finding my way with what felt right and, importantly, not worrying about making something beautiful or finished. Below are some of my favorite results from this process.


















From the original simple forms that might invoke ideas of body parts, babies, and simple plant forms, I ended up finding references to science (at atom?), water animals, and cell clusters. I also found an unexpected decorative element in the form of some (roughly) bisymmetrical ornamental shapes and borders, as well as decorative forms created by the white space caught within repeated forms.

* Incidentally, "embedding" is also a pregnancy word!