11″x8.5″; elements from vintage Life magazines, a St Joseph’s newsletter taken from my father’s nursing home, scraps from a New Orleans magazine featuring a funeral second line umbrella and other paper scraps on greyboard; 2024. Courtesy of the artist.
ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSIONS AT KOLAJ FEST NEW ORLEANS 2025
Roundtable Discussions
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Kolaj Fest New Orleans is a multi-day festival and symposium about contemporary collage and its role in art, culture, and society, 25-29 June 2025. Visit the website to learn more, see an overview of the program, and register to attend.
Roundtable Discussions
Roundtable Discussions are opportunities for collage artists to come together to discuss subjects, artist practices, projects, or other topics that warrant deeper dialogue. Here is a selection taking place at Kolaj Fest New Orleans in 2025:
ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION AT KOLAJ FEST NEW ORLEANS
Writer’s Corner
This informal workshop is a space for those with a writing practice to connect with one another. Author and collagist Kirk Read (Portland, Oregon, USA) will kick off the space with an exercise centered on visual and word practices. He wrote, “We will explore how these language and visual practices inform each other, how they compete and argue and agree in our minds and hands. Using generative writing experiments, we will create titles, move past stuck places and animate our personal writing. We will use fast collage paste-up to breathe life into our writing practice and quickly tap into the weird parts of our creative landscape.” In the past year, Erica Trabold (Lynchburg, Virginia, USA) has been using prompts to take her practice to unexpected places. “One collage prompt even resulted in an entire series I wouldn’t have otherwise made,” she wrote. “As a writing professor, I assign and use prompts constantly—but I had never explored them in the visual art space.” Trabold will share what she’s learned. Anthony D Kelly (Castlebar, Co. Mayo, Ireland) often uses the cross activation of collage practices and literary mediums to spur on new moments of inspiration and to deepen the experience of both for an audience. He believes in both words and images as seeds which can give rise to each other and that by “changing channels” between these modes of expression we can nurture unexpected and exciting new works. Kelly will invite participants to consider this concept and lead a short playful visualization exercise along these lines to free up the imaginative process.
ABOUT THE PRESENTERS
Kirk Read is the author of the memoir How I Learned to Snap, which was an American Library Association Honor Book. He lives in Portland, Oregon and is the co-leader of the Pacific Northwest Collage Collective. He received a Bronze award from Contemporary Collage Magazine. His collage is in Kolaj Institute’s Collage Artist Trading Cards, Pack 10, and has appeared in Khora and RFD. He recently co-organized “NO/STALGIA”, a collage exhibit featuring over 80 artists from around the world. He was the founder and director of Army of Lovers, organizing over 300 arts events in San Francisco. He toured with Sister Spit and the Sex Workers Art Show. He is at work on a novel called Fannie Floyd and the Book of Life and works as a public health nurse with unhoused people detoxing from street drugs. Learn more at the Kolaj Magazine Artist Directory and on Instagram @anotherkirkread.
Erica Trabold is a collage artist, essayist, and author of Five Plots, winner of the inaugural Deborah Tall Lyric Essay Book Prize, and the chapbook Dots. With Zoe Bossiere, she co-edited the anthology The Lyric Essay as Resistance: Truth from the Margins. Trabold has exhibited in group shows sponsored by the National Collage Society, La Luz de Jesus Gallery, Hera Gallery, and other arts organizations, nationally and internationally, including “Amuse Bouche” at LeMieux Galleries during Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2024. She took part in Collage Artist Residency Scotland: Castles as Buildings, Metaphors, & Systems of Power in Spring 2024. The artist writes and teaches in central Virginia. Learn more at the Kolaj Magazine Artist Directory.
Anthony D Kelly is an illustrator, writer, visual artist, and integrative psychotherapist, with extensive experience as a Gallery Administrator, Curator and Project Facilitator from his time at Basement Project Space in Cork, Ireland. He was chosen as Kolaj Magazine‘s World Collage Day Artist 2023. His work has been shown across Ireland, Europe and in the US and he delivered workshops and lectures at Collagistas Festivals 5 & 6 in Dublin and Brussels. His work has been featured in many publications including Art Reveal, Creativ Paper, Murze Magazine, Kolaj Magazine, PoetryXCollage Vols. 2 and 7, Kolaj Magazine World Collage Day 2023 Special Edition, Collage Artist Trading Cards, Pack 9, and the recently released publications Empty Columns are a Place to Dream, Artists in the Archives, and Frankenstein; or the Modern Prometheus from Kolaj Institute and Kasini House. His work is in the permanent collections of Mayo County Council, Kolaj Institute, and The Henry Sheldon Museum of Vermont History. His studies include Arts Administration, Arts Participation and Global Development and Humanistic Psychotherapy. Kelly lives and works in Castlebar, Co. Mayo, Ireland. Learn more at the Kolaj Magazine Artist Directory and www.freeformtrouble.com.
14″x11″; vintage magazine page; 2018. Courtesy of the artist.
ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION AT KOLAJ FEST NEW ORLEANS
Collage Critique
During this session, Seattle, Washington area artists Cheryl Chudyk and Sharon Wherland will lead a discussion and art critique. They wrote, “Collage has been surging its way forward in the art world, but while strong ideas and concepts are important in the discourse of art publication and exhibition, what impetus and framework exists for collage artists as a whole to improve their work and propel the medium forward? While many Kolaj Fest attendees do come from a formal art background, often in graphic design, printmaking, photography or otherwise, and may cringe at the word crit, many of us are introverts creating from the isolation of our own studios. Collage is so accessible, it does hold a strong draw for the average layperson to become an artist. By embracing the importance of self-critique and group critique within one’s practice, it will go miles toward elevating collage as a medium that can competently compete against traditionally accepted art forms.” Participants should come prepared with an artwork that they would like to be critiqued. Not all pieces will necessarily be critiqued. Chudyk and Wherland will present a critical framework for group discussion.
ABOUT THE PRESENTERS
Cheryl Chudyk is a Canadian artist currently based out of Seattle. She has a background in wedding photography, ballet, jazz, and contemporary dance. She dabbles in painting, comics, and poetry, and, by day, she is a practicing pharmacist. Her collage work appears in the Kolaj Institute’s PoetryXCollage Vols. 1 & 2 and the book Folklore of the Upper Nithsdale, as well as {th ink}, Cults of Life, OLTRE, COOLAGE, transitional MOMENTS, and 6 issues of Cut Me Up Magazine, and she has exhibited her work in the US and Europe. She took part in Kolaj Institute’s Collage Artist Residency Scotland in September 2022 and the initial Poetry & Collage Residency. Her work is part of Kolaj Institute’s Collage Castell project and in Schwitters’ Army Collection of Collage Art in Sanquhar, Scotland. She is the president of The Northwest Collage Society, a member of @thecollageclub on Instagram, and co-curator and co-founder of Sharp Hands Gallery. Learn more on Instagram @stitchpixie.
Sharon Wherland is an artist and violinist living in Redmond, Washington. She studied painting and music at Western Washington University and holds a Masters in Arts Education from Simon Fraser University. She has worked as an artist and educator, teaching in Washington and Guatemala, where she worked for a year as the artist in residence, exhibiting paintings, teaching and performing concerts and lecture-recitals in the schools. Wherland has also exhibited regularly in group and solo shows throughout the Pacific Northwest, and has work in the collection of the City of Bellevue.
ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION AT KOLAJ FEST NEW ORLEANS
Grief, Loss, & Recovery
Jennifer Lynn Davis, Missy Arellano, Jamie Amdal Hughes
What is the role of art in grief, loss, and recovery? In this Roundtable Discussion, artists are invited to share projects centered around grief, loss, and recovery. The conversation will be facilitated by artists with experience making this work who will share examples from their practice.
The collage practice of Bloomington, Indiana, Mexican American collage artist Jennifer Lynn Davis (image above) developed after she was admitted to a drug rehabilitation facility in West Palm Beach, Florida. She writes, “This facility offered an amazing art program that not only helped me get sober, but changed my entire life. I started making collages and everyone was shocked and impressed when they were seeing them. I came home to a whole new world not only because of COVID, but because I finally felt like I could call myself a real artist. I started viewing art in a whole new way. I decided to make a goal to share my art wherever I can. I will be clean and sober for four years in March of 2024. I am proud of my story and thrilled to share it with anyone willing to listen.” Davis will speak about the role collage played in her recovery and sobriety and about a series of collages she made to honor her friend.
Grief and loss often puts one in conversation with material culture. What do we do with the deceased’s estate? What do we hold on to? What do we give to others? What do we throw away? What objects hold joy and memory? A collage installation by New Orleans, Louisiana artist Jamie Amdal Hughes (image top) that was exhibited at Kolaj Institute Gallery in April and May 2024 combined original artwork, family photographs, poetry, and other ephemeral made or collected in response to the successive deaths of her father, architect James Russell Amdal, and mother, artist Nancy “Lou Lou” Martin Amdal, in 2024 and 2023 respectively. The artist wrote, “Amdalia was born out of grief and trauma, but the collages I created in this period helped me reconnect with the joy, love, and creativity that was the foundation of our Amdal family.”
14″ diameter; clock, analog collage, digital photography, watercolor, and thread on paper. Courtesy of the artist.
Belmont, Massachusetts artist Missy Arellano participated in Kolaj Institute’s 2025 Joy & Grief Artist Residency where she made a collaged clock that drew on her personal journey to uncover joy in the face of trauma and loss. Working from a photograph taken at The Noah Purifoy Outdoor Art Museum in Joshua Tree, California, Arellano contemplated the life of her son, who is biracial and named after a deceased friend of hers. She wrote, “This work speaks to the joy and grief of motherhood. Having children is supposed to be a joyous occasion, but there is a lot of pain that lies behind bearing a child. And there is a lot of guilt when you just can’t find the joy…Grief doesn’t have a fixed time frame in which we will magically wake up and feel better. And alternatively, joyful moments can’t be scheduled.”
ABOUT THE PRESENTERS
Mexican American collage artist Jennifer Davis was born and raised in New Castle, Indiana. She holds a BA in Communication Studies from Indiana University. Using glue sticks, magazines, and acrylic, Jennifer spends her free time hand making collage art about many subjects. At Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2024, Davis was part of the symposium, “Grief, Loss, & Recovery”. The artist lives and works in Bloomington, Indiana. Learn more at www.collagesbyjennifer.com.
Jamie Amdal Hughes is the daughter of two “black sheep” from Decatur, Illinois who settled in New Orleans when she was just a toddler. After years of struggling to reconnect to her artistic roots through the day to day demands of motherhood, a career in real estate, and caring for aging parents, she found relief, freedom, and playful creativity through collage in her early 40s. Her mother abruptly died in the summer of 2023 followed by her father in 2024, and she subsequently dove into collage as a way to process her grief and trauma, reaffirm her identity as an artist, and connect with the larger creative community. She continues her collage work with a focus on honoring her family legacy while also affirming her own artistic voice. Hughes’ collage installation, Amdalia, was exhibited as part of “Joy & Grief: An Exhibition of Collage” at the Kolaj Institute Gallery in April and May 2025. She also had work in “Amuse-Bouche” at LeMieux Galleries and “S&WBNO Billing Issues” at Second Story Gallery, as part of Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2024. The artist also took part in Collage Artist Residency Scotland in September 2023. Learn more on Facebook @jamieamdal.hughes.
Missy Arellano holds a BA in Art History and French from California State University, Long Beach, an MPA from the University of Southern California, and an Ed.M. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Over more than two decades, the artist has contributed to a wide range of creative initiatives, from facilitating children’s programming in museums to managing artists at festivals, fundraising for public television, and teaching young children about contemporary art. Arellano took part in Kolaj Institute’s Joy & Grief Virtual Collage Residency in March 2025. The artist lives and works in the Boston area. Learn more at www.missyarellano.com.
Kolaj Fest New Orleans is a multi-day festival and symposium about contemporary collage and its role in art, culture, and society, 25-29 June 2025. Visit the website to learn more, see an overview of the program, and register to attend.