Your description of the studio you visited in Paris sounds like you’re describing my own. And I also tried making little collages on a trip to the UK in 2022. It got too hectic to keep it up but I got a couple completed in my sketchbook. I’ll be out of the country this summer again and hope to at least collect materials, even if I don’t do much making as I travel. Thank you for all the inspiration! ✂️
Thanks Laurie! Yes, we collagists are a unique and interesting bunch in the art world. Yes, it can be a little too hectic sometimes on a trip especially if you have an itinerary. Hence, when I travel I build my itinerary around collaging at least 3 hours a day. You have to plan it into the trip or, like you say, just collect stuff for later. But I like the provenance of having made the work in situ. That element of having made the work 'on location' is important to me. Have a great trip!
Right now I am planning on a collage safari in NYC this coming spring with another collagist. We are planning on a week of hunt and gather and making as many collages as we can in a week. If we can pull it off, we will try to arrange an exhibition on the last day and see if we can sell enough to pay for our trip. Seems like a fun idea.
"Collagists are consummate collectors of the flotsam and jetsam of the surrounding environment to amass the materials needed for their work." - SUCH A GREAT DESCRIPTION
One of the things that fascinates me is the blurry, wavering, ever-moving line between an artist's collections/ stash and "hoarding" ... I tend to take the view on mental health that something is only a problem if it's harming you or others or if you want to change it for any reason but can't - so I definitely don't think have a huge messy collection of materials and supplies is in and of itself a problem - but I know people for whom it is a problem because they ultimately don't really make their art because they are mired in their mess. It's an intriguing situation to me.
Yes that is an intriguing situation Kathryn! Well established collagists would appear to be hoarders because of the need for a huge collection of paper materials which form their artist palette for working at their art form. There is that need for a massive amount of debris. And, in the collecting of it, a thousand other interesting things come into their collections that they have for 'research' purposes - namely for the love of having it to look at and refer to. These things help for inspiration.
The ones who have a really big problem are the assemblage artists because of the added third dimension! I used to know an assemblage artist in Dallas that was in a gallery I was in who inherited a good amount of money so spent a chunk of it on a six story warehouse building for his collection of materials to make his assemblages. As I remember it, he had his studio on one floor and the other five floors for his 'supplies'. I never visited him at his studio so I never got a chance to see it. Somebody told me he even had a stuffed rhino on one of the floors.
When it comes to hoarding, that is a different emotional problem. One of my other friends in Fort Worth Texas that did construction work told me of his experience of a TCU professor and his family. My friend was asked to come into to fix something or other and was amazed to enter their house where there were only tiny walkways through the house and all of the remaining space was completely filled with piles of books and clothing and who knows what and even the beds were covered except for skinny space to sleep on. I would guess that would be hoarders. My friend said the place had a depressing atmosphere about it. Maybe the prof. was working on his Ph.D dissertation of something. haha.
But I think the main thing with artists' collections and hoarding is purposeful organization and if they are using the materials or just letting things gather. Look at museums or the Library of Congress, or the Smithsonian, that is hoarding on a massive scale except that it is all inventoried, organized and in use for exhibition and research at great expense. Hence my other article: Things Accumulate.
Making art is so essential to an Artists lifeblood. Dramatic, yes, but it’s true.
I didn’t discover this until I was 62. I took a welding class. My instructor gave me the title of “ Your an Artist.” When I finally gave in and submitted my work to a few galleries it was accepted and sold! To my amazement!
I’m now 75 and am able to say those words...I’m an Artist.
Keep repeating and affirming yourself.
Art comes in all forms, decorating your home, dressing yourself, arranging food, painting, collages, metal art, ect.
Working with your hands to create. Never diminish your gift, play, cultivate and create.
Hi Linda! That's a great story and some great advice. Art in all its forms, that is to say artfulness is the original human language. Once humans start doing something as a habit they eventually figure out how to do it artfully.
Love reading your Paris memory, Of small spaces and setting to make with whatever is at hand. And meeting up with Matthew Rose. During one of our stays in Paris, at the Cité international des arts, we participated in an open studio night. And Rose came and hung out. We didn’t know him other than by name and I can’t remember how he knew to come over. It was very crowded, perhaps because we did a nice wine and food spread, but we did chat a bit. My husband is a collage - assemblage artist but in Paris he was doing close up texture photos. Easier to bring home. And I was doing tiny collages with bits of gathered paper. It was a rich creative time.
Your description of the studio you visited in Paris sounds like you’re describing my own. And I also tried making little collages on a trip to the UK in 2022. It got too hectic to keep it up but I got a couple completed in my sketchbook. I’ll be out of the country this summer again and hope to at least collect materials, even if I don’t do much making as I travel. Thank you for all the inspiration! ✂️
Thanks Laurie! Yes, we collagists are a unique and interesting bunch in the art world. Yes, it can be a little too hectic sometimes on a trip especially if you have an itinerary. Hence, when I travel I build my itinerary around collaging at least 3 hours a day. You have to plan it into the trip or, like you say, just collect stuff for later. But I like the provenance of having made the work in situ. That element of having made the work 'on location' is important to me. Have a great trip!
Right now I am planning on a collage safari in NYC this coming spring with another collagist. We are planning on a week of hunt and gather and making as many collages as we can in a week. If we can pull it off, we will try to arrange an exhibition on the last day and see if we can sell enough to pay for our trip. Seems like a fun idea.
"Collagists are consummate collectors of the flotsam and jetsam of the surrounding environment to amass the materials needed for their work." - SUCH A GREAT DESCRIPTION
One of the things that fascinates me is the blurry, wavering, ever-moving line between an artist's collections/ stash and "hoarding" ... I tend to take the view on mental health that something is only a problem if it's harming you or others or if you want to change it for any reason but can't - so I definitely don't think have a huge messy collection of materials and supplies is in and of itself a problem - but I know people for whom it is a problem because they ultimately don't really make their art because they are mired in their mess. It's an intriguing situation to me.
Yes that is an intriguing situation Kathryn! Well established collagists would appear to be hoarders because of the need for a huge collection of paper materials which form their artist palette for working at their art form. There is that need for a massive amount of debris. And, in the collecting of it, a thousand other interesting things come into their collections that they have for 'research' purposes - namely for the love of having it to look at and refer to. These things help for inspiration.
The ones who have a really big problem are the assemblage artists because of the added third dimension! I used to know an assemblage artist in Dallas that was in a gallery I was in who inherited a good amount of money so spent a chunk of it on a six story warehouse building for his collection of materials to make his assemblages. As I remember it, he had his studio on one floor and the other five floors for his 'supplies'. I never visited him at his studio so I never got a chance to see it. Somebody told me he even had a stuffed rhino on one of the floors.
When it comes to hoarding, that is a different emotional problem. One of my other friends in Fort Worth Texas that did construction work told me of his experience of a TCU professor and his family. My friend was asked to come into to fix something or other and was amazed to enter their house where there were only tiny walkways through the house and all of the remaining space was completely filled with piles of books and clothing and who knows what and even the beds were covered except for skinny space to sleep on. I would guess that would be hoarders. My friend said the place had a depressing atmosphere about it. Maybe the prof. was working on his Ph.D dissertation of something. haha.
But I think the main thing with artists' collections and hoarding is purposeful organization and if they are using the materials or just letting things gather. Look at museums or the Library of Congress, or the Smithsonian, that is hoarding on a massive scale except that it is all inventoried, organized and in use for exhibition and research at great expense. Hence my other article: Things Accumulate.
Making art is so essential to an Artists lifeblood. Dramatic, yes, but it’s true.
I didn’t discover this until I was 62. I took a welding class. My instructor gave me the title of “ Your an Artist.” When I finally gave in and submitted my work to a few galleries it was accepted and sold! To my amazement!
I’m now 75 and am able to say those words...I’m an Artist.
Keep repeating and affirming yourself.
Art comes in all forms, decorating your home, dressing yourself, arranging food, painting, collages, metal art, ect.
Working with your hands to create. Never diminish your gift, play, cultivate and create.
For me it’s a placeholder in my life.
Thank you for your art, this space, and sharing.
Hi Linda! That's a great story and some great advice. Art in all its forms, that is to say artfulness is the original human language. Once humans start doing something as a habit they eventually figure out how to do it artfully.
Love reading your Paris memory, Of small spaces and setting to make with whatever is at hand. And meeting up with Matthew Rose. During one of our stays in Paris, at the Cité international des arts, we participated in an open studio night. And Rose came and hung out. We didn’t know him other than by name and I can’t remember how he knew to come over. It was very crowded, perhaps because we did a nice wine and food spread, but we did chat a bit. My husband is a collage - assemblage artist but in Paris he was doing close up texture photos. Easier to bring home. And I was doing tiny collages with bits of gathered paper. It was a rich creative time.
Thanks for that great story Mim! Very cool. Yes Paris is a pretty cool city. I really like it. I guess I have been three time now.