All in Collage
Hanging onto ideas of how to draw can keep you in a strait jacket. It’s often the way we are judged as a child; if you can draw then you’ll make a good artist. If not, forget it. Leaning to scribble and muck around is a constant challenge. That’s where a drawing group can help you dare to draw. This has a flow on effect in your ability to embrace imperfection.
Long held beliefs about your own problem solving abilities can hold you back from experimenting and moving forward. I’ve discovered that instead of meeting the problem ‘head on’, it’s easier to go around the edges of things, whittling away until a solution presents itself. Like cutting with scissors to create silhouette shapes for collage.
I’ve been calming my turbulent thoughts with colour experiments to create a series of paste papers. The colours reminded me of the earth, of the bark of trees and how trees form communities the same as humans do. All hues, shapes and colours depending on where we grow, how we put down our roots, how we are all connected by the blessing of this earth.
Art activism is my way of maintaining optimism in the face of adversity. So many calamities are happening in the world I often feel overwhelmed and powerless. That’s where small grass roots projects like The Postcard Project – Finding Hope’ is a way I can add my artistic voice to keep hope alive.
Where to begin and how will your creative story progress? I’ve found it easier to start new artworks from the ‘seed activators’ of works you have already made and liked. It’s similar to following a story structure, the ‘once upon a time’ that ushers in a magical engagement with the imagination.
Creating art can be a tumultuous activity. Often things don’t turn out the way you hoped, or you can get stuck on an idea that doesn’t work. What to do to whether those rough creative seas? Collage is my go-to activity when ‘in-between’ projects.
I am appreciating the strong titanium plates that now live within me. Playing with stencils of their abstracted shapes makes visible an inner landscape to explore as I emerge from creative hibernation.
Collages are for me a kind of Memento Mori, a reminder of mortality and that what we do with our lives defines us. Much of our activities can be traced to the objects with which we surround ourselves. Unearthing these early collages from my own archives reveals a biographical portrait of my family ancestry.
How can we use the motions of our body to create marks and can these marks become maps that lead us back into an active arts practice? I contemplate these ideas as I pack my bags (again) to travel to the UK this week. Walking and mapping will help me document my 10 months away.
I absolutely love boats and ferries. My 2021 vision board was all about embarking on a sailing adventure, but so far this has eluded me. Now I am taking action to see if I can make this vision come true.
