Collage: Some Process Notes

February 02, 2012

Collage: Some Process Notes

We skipped a week, so it was doubly great to get together yesterday with my art pal Rita. I'd look up from my collage every once in awhile to take a peek at the detailed feathers of the rooster she was busy drawing with her Rapidograph. Absolutely gorgeous! I hope she decides to post it so I can link to it and show you!

While Rita was drawing, I managed to collage two more pages in the book I bound for Revel In The Moment. Bear in mind that these are raw pages, just the collage, and any paint, pen work, lettering or other marks and color will come later.

While I usually work finished page by finished page, my plan for this book is a little different. Each page will be collaged until the book is full. I'll do either a flip video or a slide presentation of the book as collage, and not post that till the entire book is finished. When I finish the book, page by page, I'll film a second video or slide and present both of these back-to-back in a blog post. It will take awhile. I work slowly, and this book is one I relax with in between other projects, so prepare to wait. Just letting you know that it's what I have in mind -- down the road a bit.

When Rita and I work together, we field journal. This means that we pack our bags with random supplies plus a few planned essentials and work with what we've brought. The little league collage came together entirely by itself. The only thing I decided upon to begin with was the image of the boy with the mit on his bat and the overall composition. Other than that, I used what I grabbed from my bag. These elements very serendipitously turned out to include a report card, a ticket, a blank check, and a measuring scale. I chose them for color, size and shape to fit the composition, not for content. That they seem to go together in story form is purely accidental. Sometimes these accidents happen and it's really fun and even a bit of a shock to step back from what you've created and see what's happened on your page.

I usually love what I'm doing, but sometimes it doesn't turn out that way. Sometimes I wrestle with a page and really struggle with it. This was one of those pages, and like most things I struggle with and am sure I'm going to hate, I came away loving this piece. You can see where I (unintentionally) distressed the page by ripping off what had been glued down. What you see is not at all what I started with, but I chose to leave the scuff marks and residual scratches and stray bits of previous glueings in place after deconstructing about half of it, then moving on. I wasn't happy until I added the bit of Hambly transparency. Repetition of the center circle and the grid of the plaid finally made it harmonize. I didn't think that out. I added what I thought it needed, where I thought it needed it, and noticed afterward that I was pleased.

Whenever I hate something or love something, I always ask myself why. Not to question myself, but to learn more about my own choices, why some work and others don't. The answer almost always has to do with a design principle that was either followed instinctively, or artfully broken.

I've mentioned before that I'm an avid reader, and that I find that my art suffers a bit when I'm not in the middle of a good work of fiction. My literary tastes are all over the place. I'm very eclectic when it comes to subject matter, just as long as the book is very, very well written. Right now I'm savoring Haruki Murakami's1Q84. It has a really meaty plot line which is revealed bit by bit through a cast of characters with very diverse and interesting lives who are presented alternatively throughout the book. I'm loving this book, and I'm taking my time with it.

But I also like quick, fun reads that tell a good story. Just before I picked up 1Q84, I finished Sara Addison Allen's third book,The Girl Who Chased the Moon: A Novel. This one took me only two days, and delighted me to no end. Very unlike 1Q84 in weight of material, but equally satisfiying. I had read Allen's first two books, and was ready to jump into the next. It did not disappoint.

I love it when bloggers I follow give book suggestions, so if your blog regularly includes a book choice or two, please include a link in a comment so I can go take a look!

Posted at 04:27 PM in Art Journals, Books, Collage, Life, Mixed Media, Revel In The Moment | Permalink

Tags: art journaling process, art journals, books, collage, collage process, fiction

Comments

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I always enjoy seeing your collages and learning about your process.

Posted by: joanne thieme huffman | February 03, 2012 at 05:16 AM

I love both your collages, Barbara, and I'd like to think there are no rights or wrongs regarding the pages you have created. There are no art journal police, or are there? I have never been formally trained for art so I'm not always sure whether I broke some rules or not. I'm watching the Strathmore Visual Journal tutorials right now with Traci Bunkers and I love how she encourages us to simply doodle. Anyhow, hope you are having a good day.

Posted by: Fran aka Redondowriter | February 03, 2012 at 01:24 PM