Collect and Collage + GIVEAWAY!!

    Like all mixed media artists, I have a large collection of materials and tools in my studio.  “Collect” contains the Latin prefix “col”,  meaning “together.”  I like to gather things together and look at them and rearrange them and try them this way and that way.  For a long time I collected words, and I gathered them together into stories and books.  These days I gather visual imagery: I hold things up next to other things to see what they look like together.  If I like how they look, I make the collection permanent, by collaging them - yes, same word origin. The interim meaning of “collage” as an art form comes via French, in which coller means to glue - in other words, to stick together.    

Collage tools of the trade

              Sometimes collage juxtaposes things that surprise us.  Sometimes we have never seen these shapes or images side by side or on top of one another before, and it makes us stop and look longer.  Wheels click in our brains.   Using collage in mixed media art also provides opportunities for patching and piecing, adding dimension and covering parts of an image that are no longer working in the composition.  Don’t like how you painted that hand?  Collage over it.  Wish this image had a different color background?  Glue it onto a piece of gelli-printed paper. (You may spy this make-the-mistake-go-away technique in my final project!)
    Very often, the stencils I am attracted to are ones whose imagery reminds me of something else, something that resonates with me, and I want to use that shape or texture with another bit or scrap of visual imagery and see what the effect is.  Sure, StencilGirl®  stencils often have descriptive names, but as much as possible I try to separate the word from the image, and just see the shape.  What does that shape look like?  Have I collected something else with those lines, or that rhythm?  I’ll go digging eagerly through my collections or ephemera or rubber stamps or vintage photos in search of something that - if I put it with this stencil - I may now see with fresh eyes.  It tells me a new story, or maybe an old story in a new way.   

Pam Carriker Stockinette Large (I used it upside down to look like evergreen boughs)

 For this column, I have been tasked with seeing things with fresh eyes on a project that is inspired by a favorite art book.  Honestly, I don’t have too many art books, but one that I have and which I refer to often for inspiration is Pam Carriker’s Art at the Speed of Life.  So without question, I wanted to use an array of her stencils and masks for my project.  I already had quite a few, but her new knitting textures really called to me.  Then there was an art journal spread in Art at the Speed of Life that really grabbed my attention - a spread that used three manila tags in the layout.  With that, I began to gather my goodies and of course, Pam Carriker stencils, masks, paints and adhesive.  I wasn’t really sure where I was heading - in my mind I was playing with the words “textile” and “text,” as well as phrases that included the word “knit,” but I was doing a lot of moving things around on the page and looking for that moment of surprise to guide me.

Face Map 3/4 Version 2 Mask

 I was drawn to this vintage photo from my collection as the “eyes” of the 3/4 Face Map mask, but it was too small and drab for my purposes.  I used some iPad magic to enhance the color and add more foreground so that it would work as a laser print (and this way I still have the original photo, too).  What caught my eye about the photograph, besides the intriguing long row of people,  was the shapes of the evergreen trees in the background - zeroing in on that shape brought more of my collected materials and tools into focus and sent me digging for others.


    The inspiration spread in Pam’s book had three tags on the edge of the recto page, but I wanted to put mine in the center of my Dylusions journal, tied into the binding thread, so that they could flip back and forth, and give the spread an interactive element and some mystery and narrative with  “the reveal.”

I had more back burner ideas about the Adirondacks Mountains (I live nearby).  Like the optometrist, I kept asking, “is it better like this? or this?”  “this way, or this way?” swapping out shapes and colors.  I kept looking at the trees; I revisited memories of canoeing on dark Adirondack waters shaded by overhanging evergreens.  Memory is the most universal collage, and we shift things around both consciously and unconsciously.

    Here.  It is done.  The infamous 1906 murder made famous by Theodore Dreiser’s An American Tragedy, on Big Moose Lake in the Adirondacks.  I collected all the pieces and shuffled them around until they fell into place, and then I glued them down: a drowned maiden’s hair.  I wasn’t expecting to create something with a tragic story, but collage is a technique that always generates surprises, and that’s why I find it so fascinating.

Carolyn Dube Hip to Be Square Small Alphabet

Face drawn using Pam Carriker 3/4 Face Map Stencil as a guide

Eye stencil from May 2017 Stencil Club "Woman of Mystery," by Pam Carriker

Background stenciled with Pam Carriker Stockinette Small Pattern and Stockinette Large

One lucky winner will receive their choice of $50 of Pam Carriker's stencils plus a signed copy of her book!

Enter by commenting below by July 1st, 2018. One winner will be chosen at random on July 2nd. Winner notified by email.