Tony Fitzpatrick was @ Pierogi in Brooklyn

Worker Ace, 2006 Mixed media on paper

Collage clearinghouse is a bit late on this one, but the online pictures are definitely worth your while. Tony Fitzpatrick had a fascinating exhibit at Pierogi entitled "The Wonder: A Portrait of Chicago."


Chicago Monster #1, 2006
Mixed media on paper

These involved and pattern-laden works totally enthrall the viewer. The bright colors, the interesting manner in which he frames the pieces with ephemera....oo la la, so rich!
The series contains several centrally styled mixed media works. I like them very much because of their graphic quality. I am a pattern freak, and he has used a plethora of them in these pieces.... The other thing I like is the use of the playing cards in this series. It ads to the symbolic nature of the work. Finally, I need to comment on the interesting texts that exist on the borders of these...I like the way they are incorporated into the work. It is subtle. He varies them red and black and that adds its own pattern. Super Nice Work!
He has a website, but you can also see this particular series on the Pierogi site.


Chicago Monster #2, 2006 Mixed media on paper

As seen on Black Eiffel - Anthro-collage-ogie

I was at the industrious and interesting black eiffel blog today and there was this exciting post about a little contest they are sponsoring. Here's the mini scoop:
"What about you... ready for another contest? How about a collage o-thon. Email me a collage that you have created with the subject of "spring". Include a description of what you like about spring, and your inspiration behind the piece. Get them to me by May 16th and we'll have readers vote on their favorites. Winner will receive a $50 gift card to Anthropologie. Happy collaging!"

Go There and Do It!

Online Collage Resource

Got an email from the folks at Art-Collecting.com telling me about their site. Here's a good resource for the collage collector...I don't really go into the collecting aspect much in this blog. There's limited funds in my pocket, and I can only spend when food and bills are covered. However, the Art-Collecting.com site has links to over 4200 galleries, which could also be of interest to collage artists looking to promote their work.

Audrey Cregan mini-exhibit

My daughter Heathers' writer friend Justin in Wilmington, NC is working on a book for online publishing on Lulu. He has paired up with this illustrator named Audrey Cregan. Heather had seen these pictures and forwarded them to me. They are really great and I am liking the textures. I don't know too much more about her except that I liked her work, but here is a mini-exhibit of some of her pieces.

Atkins Food Pyramid


I don't understand my mail

There's buffalo in my yard

Collage Roots

Start in 2008. If you read this blog at all, you will know that recently I came into possession of some treasured family photos. My uncle has been sending me packages and every few days lately as he plans to leave the country to live in Thailand. Each package, I get another dose of memory. They are mostly memories of my family, but there is one collage memory. I don't have a lot of collage memories, after all, who does? It's excellent to have even one.

In '94, just a couple of years before I started doing any collages, I took my 2 daughters out to Seattle to visit my Uncle and we spent some time pouring over the old photos. My Uncle obtained them after my grandmother has passed away. I had not seen them ever, and it was excellent to be able to see views of times past. As we looked them over, I found this one piece that made me laugh. It was a collage that my grandmother had done using her own photo in one of her photo albums. It made one of those indelible photo-type impressions you get thruout your life. Stayed in there.

Skip to 1999, when I began doing collage work. Suddenly this little glimpse of a collage rose up from my memory and I decided I wanted to see the collage again. Well, my Uncle is a bit of an adventurer, and he traveled all over the place back then. Getting a hold of a specific photo from someone that travels everywhere and lives across the country was impossible. In fact, I didn't even try. But I kept thinking of this little collage, and already I treasured the fact that my Grandma did an impromptu collage, hell these were my collage roots!

Back to 2008. By now you must be guessing the ending of this personal little tale. In yesterdays' package was the photo album with the little collage. How sweet that this should end up in my hands. It's my collage roots, baby.



The piece is very simple. How can something so simple mean so much?

Nicola Starr

Nicola Starr, an artist from England, features a few collage galleries on her illustration website.
The Catcher in the Rye is a gallery featuring works that were inspired by the book of the same name. I really liked the collective nature of this set of pieces. These are collages that utilize a neutral color scheme and then she adds these little swaths of red and they pack just the punch that is needed. The red segments really seemed to bring these pieces together. Theme-wise it works nicely. (and I have to admit I haven't read the book, but now that I have looked at these pieces, AND read the wiki explanation of the book, I am intrigued and now I need to read it, even if just to be able to better reach the messages that these works may contain!)


Another gallery available on her site is called State Magazine. These were pieces that were from a magazine with a most fascinating title called Stop To Appreciate The Echo. These I am just nuts about because I like the bits of natural imagery that she employed on these pieces. They have a loose format, with informal placement of subjects, which of course I am also a fan of. (reminds me of ths and his gluebooks)


I wish there was more to see, but then again, I guess I shall have to bookmark her site for another visit further on down the road.

Gruss Aus Schwekschne

Gruss Aus Schwekschne
Originally uploaded by misphit

Welcome to the Raisin Bran Box Revival.
Trying to think out of the box.

Elbows

Elbows
Originally uploaded by misphit

Another in the series of the Lithuanian Boxed Set.

GraciaLouise from Australia

Image above, page detail from The Dubious Clue (also published under the title, Extinct animals sing the Blues)
The mailbox at CollageClearinghouse is chock full of goodies. Now that my computer is on board again, I need to get caught up with all these new things and do some sharing!

GraciaLouise = Gracia Haby + Louise Jennison = Australian Collage Pals
This prolific duo has such a refreshing and natural way of looking at things. There are a whole bunch of very intriguing little artists books that they display on their website. I am such a fan of artists books, and these are really cool.
Gracia does illustrative post card collages. When big animals collide with little people, I immediately start going fairy tale awol. I am always drawn to pieces that are telling a story. I do enjoy abstract artwork too, for different reason, however the child in me is appeased by artwork that contains characters, especially animals that I know and love like foxes and owls and an occasional badger.


There are lots o' places to view this pairs' imagination. They have an etsy shop, blogs, a website, and a hoot of stuff on flickr.

Collage on a Pink Toilet Paper Box

pink box

Did another collage using the family collection. Trying something more free form, utilizing some boxes I liked. In particular, the pink Scott Tissue toilet paper box.
Having computer issues these last days. Will be back to real posting tomorrow!!


pink box — detail

Torn

Torn
Originally uploaded by misphit

Lithuanians were displaced during the 2 World Wars. Soviet and Nazi forces gathered together and attempted to assimilate the country. Many Jews were killed. Families were sent to concentration camps, while their culture and identity was torn apart. My grandmother left before she was 20.

A Short History of (E.K.A.)

A Short History of (E.K.A.)
Originally uploaded by misphit

My first piece using the family photo collection.

Lithuanian Collage

Sveksna, Lithuania — 1932
My Grandmother on my Mom's side was born and raised in Lithuania. She ended up working on Jewish ship as a cook in order to earn her passage to the United States in the 30's when she was young. She often spoke of her homeland and had a little collection of photos that she kept close to her heart to remind her of the family she left behind. I am working on archiving the photos for my family, but while I am working on them, I can't help but feel the presence of those across the ocean.

I ended up copying some of the photos and I plan to do some new works using them and their history as a theme. I have used vintage photos for years and I have always remained objective and detached from the subject matter that I use. In this case tho, I already am feeling the strange emotional pull from the faces that are staring back at me. I hope it brings out some emotional work, isn't that the goal? The whole lesson I have learned in all of the studying I have done about artists and their lives is that YOU are the art. This should help, having some of "me" to use!

I did a google search and found some really beautiful and amazing things on the site of Joyce Ellen Weinstein. I want to post pix, but she specifically has asked that no one does this, so I will refrain. It's still worth checking out.

More from the Victorian Invoice Book

Sufficient unto the day is
The Evil Thereof.

Happy Friday.

Jeff Koons quote

note: For background information on this post, read this.

Art Rogers
Photograph:
Puppies
1980


Jeff Koons
Wood painted sculpture:
String of Puppies
1998

I liked this quote by Jeff Koons that I read in "Inside the Art World: Conversations with Barbaralee Diamonstein" regarding his popular work Puppy:

BLDS: Why don't you think it is a case of plagiarism, when you have the two images side by side?

JK: Okay. First of all, I believe in an objectiverealm, and I was educated by the work of Pablo Picasso, Marcel Duchamp, Kurt Schwitters, Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein. I was brought up in this culture, and I respond in this culture. I have never, in any manner, plagiarized anybody. I have created a vocabulary and created a body of work, Banality, that was absolutely influential and radical in the culture that I participate in. To me, the postcard was a ready-made. The postcad itself and my String of Puppies (1988) are 2 totally different things, totally different. One is a photograph, that is only 2-dimensional—mine is 3-dimensional. This postcard is probably about three by five inches, mine's bigger than life, and it's in wood, a spiritual material—carved by people who carve the saints. I combine some postcard of some old woman that I found with a daisy in her hand, and daisies in her hair, and I put daisies there.I animated the dogs to some Italian blue dog in a cartoon strip and made the puppies all blue, with brown noses. I painted it with Buddha type of colors, orange and blues and greens. I made a parody of Seward A. Johnson, benches, and George Segal—this type of public thing. To me, I was using something as though it were a letter in an alphabet. And if artists cannot use things that are already here, this means that I cannot function in an objective realm, that I must be a masturbator, that I have to deal with the self, and I can't deal in things beyond the self, that I can't create in the objective realms, I can't create in the realms of association and create my vocabulary there. That means I cannot make any form of visual protest, that I am censored against visual images."

Rauschenberg on Ovation Tonite

For anyone interested, there is a show about Robert Rauschenberg on Ovation tonite @ 9:00 pm EST. He did some serious collages in addition to assemblages he called Combines. Should be a very interesting show....

Robert Rauschenberg
Canyon
1959
mixed mediums with taxidermy bald eagle and pillow, ca. 87 x 70 x 24 in.
Sonnabend Collection

How to Draw a Bunny—A closer look at Ray J.

I watched How to Draw a Bunny last night on Ovation. I have been wanting to see this flick forever, it seems. I am too cheap to go and buy the vid, and when I saw it was going to air on TV, I had a rare moment and sat in front of the brainwashing machine for a couple of hours and watched.

I have read a lot about Ray Johnson, and his intrigue factor grows instead of wanes as I learn more about him! The clips in the movie were invaluable to cluing me in on the type of person he really was. I felt there was something uneasy about him, as tho probably he had one up on you all the time. His intellect seemed extraordinarily high, since his humor and outlook on life were so unique.


I found myself envying his position in time, living in NYC and hanging out with the art crowd, living poor and living rich all at the same time. It must have been such a great time. (easy for me to say, they were poor as hell and barely ate.) I wonder how our times compare! (I am poor as hell, not much has changed) As I watched the movie, I thought about how odd he seemed, how even talking about him seemed to cause a bit of frustration from his peers...I don't live near a city, so palling around with famous art folk isn't in my picture. However, I do have my little network of unique and creative friends and I thank them for allowing me the freedom to be a weirdo! The social life wasn't really Ray's thing, and he became more and more reclusive the older he got.
For some strange reason, I always feel the need to see what others are doing, and once I see how bizarre people can be, it releases me somehow and I get the freedom to do what I want, to accept the weirdo that I am. It's silly and I am foolish, I don't know why I feel I need social approval! It aint' gonna happen! I will always feel a bit odd, I will always not fit in, for me it is a useless approach to things.

I watched a documentary on Andy Warhol the other night, also on Ovation. I was never a big fan, and somehow felt Warhol was cheating by making prints. (i have a different opinion now) I have liked his pieces, graphically, but I never understood him. Now I understand how he also was odd. He acted upon this in a different way tho, hanging out with everyone and being the center of parties, the friend of celebrities, the means to a damn good time. He was far from reclusive. They knew each other and hung out, and that's even more crazy. Each of them was unique and genius enough, together they were probably quite intimidating and even devastating!!!
I recommend you see this movie if you have a chance. It's huge to understand the depth of how these people LIVED their art. They WERE the art.

1859 Invoice Book

I was lucky enough to get my hands on a very old and decaying book, my favorite kind! It was an old Victorian collage scrapbook. It was a Victorian pasttime to paste images into albums. I really liked the fact that some frugal folk from long gone days....re-constituted this old used ledger and reclaimed it for a scrapbook. These days paper is so easy to come by, I can't imagine having to hold onto and savor every scrap.
This book was originally an "Invoice Book". The cover has a stunning ultramarine and sepia aged and marbled cover. Inside, the pages are covered with the beautiful flowing script of days past.


This sets a tone, providing a textured background for the paste ups. The pages are brittle and the edges are torn. On some pages, most of whatever strength the pages has comes from the pasted objects themselves!

There is something very endearing about the manner in which this book was done. I have the opportunity to share pages with you, so I am going to pepper them in as I can.


Some of the images are also available on my flickr account. I am also willing to send you hi-res if you request it.
I wanted to look at this book as one of the roots of collage. It wasn't all just braque and picasso, it was also people at home, doing all sorts of things that do not include TV or computers!

10th International Collage Exhibition/Exchange

A sample from the Collection Gallery, Inspired by Nature
collage with pearl buttons & stitchingon watercolour card
by Frieda Oxenham

Frieda Oxenham
lives in West Linton, Peeblesshire, UK

Dale Copeland has announced the posting of the 10th International Collage Exhibition. Online can be found the collage work of 160 various artists from around the world. According to her site,
160 artists have each made 13 collages, each approximately 8" X 10".
The work from each artist shown in The Collection exhibition will become part of the collection of the Amarillo Museum of Art in Texas. The work from each artist shown here and offered for sale is also being exhibited in the Real Tart gallery of New Plymouth, New Zealand during April.
A package of 11 mixed collages is sent back to each participating artist.

The addition of "The Selling Exhibition" offers a place for those interested in purchasing collage works online via the Virtual TART site. This was a great idea and hopefully it will be another avenue for getting fine art collage into the hands of those that are wanting. Good luck to those participating!

Basking in Her Transparency

Basking in Her Transparency
Originally uploaded by misphit

For Sharon Springs DK.

Fornax Chemica

Fornax Chemica
Originally uploaded by misphit

Practicing for the celestial maiden. This will be inserted inside a wooden box. I want to rig up red LED lights in the center of the 3 targets.

Meet Miss Adjust-O-Matic

front view of Adjust-O-Matic

This is a cardboard dressform. Vintage, found it in an antique mall in Little Falls, NY for $20. Had to have it! She will become the Celestial Maiden. I have the need to document my faith in the universe, the planets. I will be using red, black and tan as a color palette for this project. She will have many constellations on her, and all of them are of my own creation--deer, squirrel, fox.... I like the constellations that we use, but they are all about myths and things I do not directly relate to. I have my own myths, my own ideas, and my own kinship with various animals. I think about drawing them on the stars and making my own celestial beings...so in this project I will do just that.
She's a bit fragile, the cardboard is slightly brittle. I am working on sealing her before I begin the artwork portion. I have a test in the corner using Golden Semi-Gloss medium. Tonite I will see if this will work. I have inserted a bushel basket inside of her torso to help keep her rounded. I will be attaching it to her via brass grommets. You will be seeing and hearing more about this girl. She will take me a couple of months to complete!

looking inside from the top at the bottom of the bushel basket

She is my second attempt at collage sculpture. I did another one 2 summers ago, and her name was Iron Maiden. She was completely constructed, however and she did not begin her life as a dressform. I used paper tape, and taped up a 14-year old with perky tits. Then I filled it up with foam insulation, and attached many other things to make this norse Iron Maiden. You can't really see all the art involved in this pic, but the cool lit top shows up nicely, anyhow.

Sketches

sketch
Originally uploaded by misphit

Been working on a new collaged sculpture. The celestial maiden.
Doing sketches to hone up my skills. These guys will need more work, I am afraid!

Tracking Invisible Cities

I am really into David Hochbaum's art...and I was poking around his packed-full website for some new inspiration. I discovered he his having a show @ Strychnin:London this month. I wish I could be there...sob sob. I am posting this to encourage all you collage heads to go and check this out. Represent yo'self!
His technique is involved and crazed, something I admire. I enjoy his creative use of photos and appreciate him sharing his pix. He's also a founder of the Goldmine Shithouse, an artist collaborative that bursts with energy.

Spend some time poking around this stuff and get inspired!

Marilyn Monroe = Public Domain

According to pr-inside.com, Marilyn Monroe is now in the public domain.
The article I read is here.... " Right now there is a lot of confusion in regards of who is still in power or not. Yet when you do some internet surfing and Google search, you find out, that Mark A. Roesler, 52, already commented on the ruling and the ground-breaking news in terms of Marilyn Monroe's freedom and her future."
According the Mark Roesler.com, (of CMG worldwide, who is :The Leader in Intellectual Property Rights Management:)... " On a more challenging front is the finding by the court that Marilyn Monroe LLC was judicially estopped by statements of the Executor of Marilyn Monroe's Estate concerning Marilyn Monroe's New York residence at the time of her death. Because New York does not recognize a post-mortem right of publicity, the Court dismissed Marilyn Monroe LLC's right of publicity claims. This ruling will almost certainly be appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals."
It goes on to say, "With both Indiana and newly revised Washington right of publicity statutes, however, Marilyn Monroe's right of publicity is firmly secured in at least these states and any acts that occur in those states are actionable under those state statutes. Marilyn Monroe's other intellectual property rights such as rights defined under the federal and international trademark laws, various copyrights, and her contractual rights with studios are unaffected by the recent finding by the California court....
My company is headquartered in Indiana with offices also in California and we protect and market almost 200 famous deceased personalities around the world. We will focus our efforts on correcting this obvious shortcoming in New York and we are confident that the citizens and famous celebrities from the state of New York, will not want the fruits of their labor taken from them after their death."

"Good Grief!!" said the collage artist.