This week, I’m working on incorporating stencils into my collages. In spite of the fact that I do this ALL THE TIME in printmaking, I haven’t really done much with it in collage. My initial moves are pretty minimal:
What I really like about collage is that it seems like a purely compositional exercise. I know…all forms of art are concerned with composition. But in collage, one can simply arrange found scraps of paper…it’s the arrangement that is the creation. Sure, some people make their own collage material…and one can certainly draw, paint, stencil, etc. on a collage. But at its most basic…collage (2d) is a composition of found papers. I find it really challenging.
I have a book of collages by Richard Meier (famous architect). They’re amazing. SO simple…yet so beautiful and provocative. He does mark his collages, so he isn’t a collage “purist”, so to speak. In grad school, we could only work with found papers, the collage had to be rectangular, and no additional marks were to be made. I know…these are more reasons why I didn’t enjoy that class.
Leave a Comment so far
Leave a comment