Art as therapy is an easy activity for me, almost automatic. I hope you are inspired to practice art as therapy as you deal with your grief.

A short while back I spent a week waiting to hear the dreaded news of the passing of a dear friend after a short time of illness. It was a long week. Every time I had a free moment to think I would end up crying, so I started creating art,  making mono prints and ended up making a visual journal or art book. I will always treasure the book as a reminder of that week of waiting and as a reminder of how God is always working in our lives to make it better even if we don’t see it.

Here are some images of the art journal pages and a brief explanation of how I made it.

On this collage page I pasted scraps of mono prints (or gelatin plate print) that didn’t turn out like I expected and a piece of yellow rice paper that I stained with diluted red ink.

The blue-green paper used on this collage page is a section of practice paper that was kind of ugly so I cut it up for collage paper. The yellow is a gelatin plate print of rosemary that was pretty but the dolphins printed over it were just awful. The pink papers I made with stencils and the gelatin plate.

First I printed the whole page pale green then I covered the gelatin plate with red paint, positioned the fern leaf and grass then pressed down the green paper. When it was dry I added some blue color by rubbing the side of a crayon over the page.

I placed a few drops of dark brown and tan acrylic paint onto the gelatin plate then rolled it out so it was blotchy looking, then pressed my paper down. When it was dry I used a stencil, a felt-pad stamp, and a medicine cup to make the circles.

I made a pink mono print with circle templates. When it was dry I used the light green paint that was on the roller to add more color. Then I made a “ghost print” of a tree template with dark green paint.

This page was headed for the trash can until I pulled a black ghost print. It started out as a practice page, but the more I added to it the uglier it got until the black print and some red paint. Then I cut out some red circles and suddenly it was beautiful.

That is often how our lives are. We think our lives just get uglier as time goes by, but God is still working in our lives and then we suddenly realize how beautiful God has made our lives!! He is so good!

Romans 8:28                                                                                                                                      And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

Philippians 1:6                                                                                                                                   For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.

Hebrews 13: 21                                                                                                                                Now the God of peace] 21 equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

1 Thessalonians 2:13                                                                                                                        For this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.