I said I may not be able to post while I’m away but I thought it would be good to make an effort so here is After Meeting At Michael’s It Was Mayhem, number 25 of 50 Collages Before Christmas. It’s about 41cm x 56cm and composed mostly of recycled drawings on gessoed leaflets (one is certainly from the Whitechapel) along with my photographs plus cuttings Inktense on handmade paper. Whilst fairly minimalist it references many of my freer drawings of landscapes. The title is a simple description of fact. I’d been to our wine merchant, Michael, and went to the studio to finish this piece. With so many collages in progress it could be described as mayhem in the studio. That’s it!
Just in case anyone is actually following my progress on this little 50 Collages Before Christmas project, I want to assure you that all is going fine. I have been steadily working on multiple pieces a the same time but not really had the time to photograph pieces properly or post on this blog! Today, for example, I had hoped to get this blog up to date but it was more important to prepare, pack and arrange transport for the six pieces I am showing in the Quartz Festival Exhibition in Taunton next week. As I am going away for the next four days and may not have a chance to post you will have to make do with No24 Mixed Messages and trust me when I tell you that I have completed 30 now. If you don’t believe me check out my Twitter feed.
Basically I have 2 weeks back in the studio before Christmas. I currently have 3 large collages underway – 2 of which I am pretty confident will make the grade. The other may surprise me yet! I also have 5 smaller works in progress and a dozen sketchbooks full of collage ideas! I am reasonably confident that I will be able to reach my target with work I am happy to put my name to.
The quality of photographs for this project is mostly pretty poor and Mixing It With Maurice In The Morning, 23/50 Collages Before Christmas, is one of the worst. I haven’t got the time – or at present with collages in progress on every surface, space – to set up lights and tripod to make a better fist of image reproduction. But you get the idea!
Don’t ask where the title came from except that I took the photo early one morning from the train to London. I don’t know if there was a man called Maurice nearby.
I had been mapping out the idea in my sketchbook and originally the idea was a long photograph or series of sections of photos and a drawn or painted black square but stuff happens, eh?
Apart from two pieces cut from a catalogue, the materials of this are my drawing and painting on to various materials – either recycling other work that didn’t work or made especially for collage.
The title for 22/50 Collages Before Christmas comes from Enter The Dragon where Bruce Lee breaks off his meeting to give a student instruction and says “Don’t think. Feel. It is like a finger pointing away to the moon. Don’t concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory. Do you understand?”
