The Perfect Notebook

I am charmed by artists’ notebooks. And, just to be clear, I don’t mean that subculture stepchild of the scrapbooking movement the “artist journal*” in which the pages are planned as finished product and, I’m sorry to say, tend to all look alike to me (Google images for “artist journal” and you’ll see).

No, I mean the genuine article in which a creative mind is storing ideas, solving problems, thinking in word and image. I am intrigued by the way artists think, which is revealed in their notebooks.

 Leonardo was a pretty impressive thinker on paper

I frequently use scraps of paper and loose leaves and then tape or glue them in. It appeals to my assemblage aesthetic. Lately I’ve been stuffing a small Moleskine notebook:

See? Loose leaves

True confession, I’m always searching for the perfect notebook, always on the lookout for the one that will work best. Whenever I visit an art supply or bookstore I’m drawn (ha!) to the sketchbook section to see if there might be that perfect one. As if, should I find it, my drawings, notes, and ideas would all be perfect too.

But there never is because, when it comes right down to it, the one that works perfectly is just the one you use. 

*By the way “art journal,” like the word “scrapbooking,” is now a verb, I’m with Calvin and Hobbes on this one (mostly Hobbes):