Melanie Mowinski

Melanie Mowinski
Williamstown, Massachusetts, USA

STATEMENT

I began my Advent Collage-A-Day practice in December 2012. I was fed up with the commercialization of the holiday season and I wanted to acknowledge and experience this time from a place of attention and intention. I began making 5″x5″ collages and pairing them with a reflective writing on my blog. The writing drew on my theological studies as I strove to link ideas of light and love into both my collage making and the words within each blog entry. This highly personal and private practice gave me something to look forward to each day and the blog posting kept me accountable. I never imagined in 2012 that these collages and writings would form the book Collage Your Life: Techniques, Prompts, and Inspiration for Creative Self-Expression and Visual Storytelling, commercially published by Storey Publishing in 2022.

My collage practice continues to come from this place of linking my interest in the cultural examination of global theological practices to daily practice. I lean towards abstract, mixed-media compositions that feature my own iconography that includes the figure, birds, and organic forms.

BIO

Melanie Mowinski likes paper: but she also loves what goes ON paper. Paper becomes a vessel on which she prints, collages, draws, constructs, and more. She draws inspiration from the landscape of her Berkshire Hills home and residencies/travels to places like Iceland, Morocco, Tasmania, Venice, and most recently, from along the Camino de Santiago in Spain. Her daily creative practice began over 20 years ago as a Peace Corps Volunteer. What began as a way to document the “toughest job she would ever love,” evolved into one of her most important artistic practices. This practice formed the foundation of Collage Your Life, published by Storey Publishing in 2022.

She’s taught workshops at Wells Book Arts Center, Williams College, Snow Farm, and other art centers around the world. She holds master degrees from Yale University and The University of the Arts. Mowinski is a Professor of Art at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (MCLA) in North Adams, MA, and is the founder and director of PRESS: Letterpress as a Public Art Project.

ARTIST CONTACT

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melaniemowinski.com

IMAGES