12″x9″; contemporary fashion magazine images, images from National Geographic, hand-printed paper from India, elements from work by Steffan Thomas on watercolor paper; 2026. Courtesy of the artist.
SYMPOSIUM AT KOLAJ FEST NEW ORLEANS 2026
Words as Pictures, Collage as Text
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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, 10-14 June 2026. Visit the website to learn more, see an overview of the program, and register to attend.
Symposium sessions at Kolaj Fest New Orleans bring together a group of artists who speak about a central theme. Artists, writers, academics, and curators present slideshows which are followed by a Question & Answer period.
For COLLAGE::BOOKS which took place in October 2025 in Montreal, Brooklyn, New York collage artist Jennella Young wrote, “Publishing is more than documentation. It is itself a creative act that shapes how ideas are assembled and carried. It’s almost its own form of collage. Artist books and zines are not secondary to exhibitions for my art work—they are exhibitions in their own right—the kind you can carry and share and hopefully treasure.” Not simply illustration, when artists pair writing and artwork, an alchemy occurs where the words can become pictures and the collage can become text. Visual literacy and textural literacy mingle and build a new world for viewers and readers in the cosmology of the contemporary art project. During this panel, we will hear from collage artists and writers with overlapping, integrated practices.
Leyden, Massachusetts collage artist, writer and photographer Trish Crapo will speak about moving between writing and collage practices. She wrote, “As both a writer and a collage artist, I am always intrigued by the ways that language and visual imagery rub up against each other, and how they question, challenge, and inform each other. I go through streaks where all I want to do is make collage. I feel freed, then, from words, and I love it! But before too long, words come creeping back in—words are my first creative language, and also the currency with which I made my living. This tension—between what can be said with language and what can be articulated visually—feels central to my collage practice.” Crapo will also present the collage work of Alice Notley (1945-2025), author of forty books of poetry, who began working in collage in the 1970s. Crapo will lead a workshop centered around Notley’s use of fans as substrates elsewhere during the festival. Crapo’s article about Notley will appear in a future issue of Kolaj Magazine.
collage; 2025. Courtesy of the artist.
Astrid Bant is a Dutch-born collagist and writer based in Montevideo, Uruguay. During her 2025 Solo Residency at Kolaj Institute, Bant spent two weeks making collage to accompany her forthcoming novel, Offering at the Altar of Impermanence. The book is set in the history of the Hippy Trail, an overland route for those traveling from Europe to West and South Asia in the 1950s to the late 1970s. Trained to do ethnographic fieldwork in small-scale societies, Bant’s “collages are dense images with a lot of detail, cultural clues, ornamentation and intense colors. I also write, and my fiction presents similar characteristics: dense plots and colorful descriptions…The through-line of the book is that the stories are set on coast lines, mangroves and beaches.” Bant will share her work and speak about how “collage can be a tool to present a critical analysis of cultural aspects of (contemporary) history in a poetic, visually interesting way, possibly engaging wider audiences in political, philosophical and artistic thought.” Seeing a number of projects that blend biography or biographical fiction and collage, she asks, Why do they go together so well? and seeks “new insights on how raw and contextualized memories can inform artists’ practice.”
9″x7″; street flyers on leather book cover; 2026. Courtesy of the artist.
Writing and Collage go hand-in-hand for Portland, Oregon writer and artist Kirk Read whose daily writing and analog collage practice often takes place alongside other artists. “I write fiction and memoir as well as performance essays. I believe in the power of handwriting, manual typewriters and the sanctity of notebooks,” wrote Read. “Art is a medicinal agent to fight against mind control, the two-party culture of agreement (pick yr poison) and an intricate but boisterous process of cultivating, protecting and nurturing eccentricity. Writing and collage are twin practices for me, informing and instigating one another.” On this panel, Read will share an essay about looking at Southern literature as a source for creative inspiration.
3.5″x4″; paper collage; 2020. Courtesy of the artist
Jackson Heights, New York artist Christine Karapetian makes collage, assemblage and monoprints. She wrote, “I am Armenian-American, the offspring of a people whose history is rooted in Diaspora. My intuitive response to this lack of place and the negation of history, by some, is to make objects that trace to, and build onto a collective memory.” On this panel, she will speak about her book project, A Scent of Otherness, “an art-text homage to my father Jack Karapetian, born 100 years ago in Iran. He emigrated to the US in 1947 and was, and remains, a cultural icon in the international Armenian Diaspora community, known by his pen name Hakob Karapents.” In early 2026, Armenia commemorated the 100th year since his birth with a postcard stamp. Karapetian’s project is a much more personal remembrance. “In pairing memory-texts with collages, I’ve recognized and acknowledged my insights into how my sensibilities as an artist were formed through knowing him. My process of collage-making mirrors his aesthetic formation: materials gathered; each with a history, arranged, altered and made into something new, while still carrying traces of their past.”
digital collage; 2022. Courtesy of the artist.
Writing and publishing has consistently flowed through Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland artist, writer, and integrative psychotherapist Anthony D Kelly‘s practice. At Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025, he presented the project, “Lexicon of Wonder” which will soon be published as a book. For each of the collages in his “Rare Monster Sighting Archives,” Kelly writes a fictional “Recorded Sighting” report. He collaborated on the children’s book, Fleadom Flea Circus, with Marta Janik. He has also been an active contributor to Kolaj Magazine and Kolaj Institute’s Collage Illustration and PoetryxCollage projects. Kelly will speak about the role writing plays in his collage practice.
Kolaj Institute’s Collage & Illustration Project is a series of residencies, publications, discussions, and exhibitions that takes vintage, public domain stories and recontextualizes them for a 21st century audience with collaborative collage illustrations. PoetryXCollage project explores and documents the intersection of poetry and collage through a series of residencies, workshops, exhibitions, and PoetryXCollage, a printed journal of artwork and writing that operates at the intersection. Ric Kasini Kadour will present a brief update to these projects.
RELATED WORKSHOPS AT KOLAJ FEST NEW ORLEANS 2026
A Fan of Collage: The Fan as Page & Substrate
Inspired by poet and collage artist Alice Notley (1945-2025), Trish Crapo has been making collage fans for over a decade. Notley, author of forty books of poetry, began working in collage in the 1970s. In an article in the journal Poetry, she wrote, “I started making collages because other poets were and they weren’t that good at it, really.” The skills and materials of collage, she continued, “…seemed available to anyone, and the form, with the addition of a few cut-out words, felt almost like that of a poem.” While she made many rectangular collages, often on cardboard from boxes people sent to her, Notley became enamored of fans—mostly semicircular, but sometimes round—as substrates for her work. In this workshop, Trish Crapo presents some of Notley’s thoughts on how the fan affected her sense of composition, and how the act of collaging interacted with the act of writing poetry. In addition, Crapo will show some of her own collage fans, inspired by Notley’s work, and talk about her experience—as both a poet and a collage artist—working with this medium. Crapo wrote, “It’s fair to say that I started making collage fans because Alice Notley was, and she was really good at it.” Participants will try their hand at working with a folding paper fan as a substrate for collage. She will share tips, as well as informally display some of her fans as examples. “Supplies will be provided, but feel free to bring along any supplies, including small trinkets, beads, etc., that are of personal significance to you (or just intrigue you). Mostly, we’ll have fun.”
Prompt Means to Make Something Happen
“Creative practice is a series of tiny decisions that may seem insignificant, but, like a human or pet relationship, repetition leads to devotion. The seemingly banal elements of a practice can lead to sublime acts of resistance and revolution.” In this workshop, Portland, Oregon writer and artist Kirk Read read will guide participants through a series of writing and collage prompts. “The practice is not about creating finished works but practicing tools as part of a daily practice that uses words and images in relationship to one another to expose the hidden and shy parts of our psyches.” Read will speak about icebreaking, visual and written listmaking and creating a visual glossary of obsessions. Participants are encouraged to bring their journals or sketchbooks but paper and pens will be provided.
ABOUT THE PRESENTERS
Montevideo, Uruguay. Astrid Bant has shown her work in solo exhibitions in Hanoi and Brasilia. Her collages and prints are in private collections all over the world and in the collection of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which purchased her collage of a 16th century Dutch-Vietnamese woman. She was a Kolaj Institute Solo Resident in May 2025 and took part in the Collage Publishing Workshop. Originally from the Netherlands, the artist lives and works in Montevideo, Uruguay. Learn more on Instagram @astridbantcollage.
Leyden, Massachusetts, USA. Trish Crapo has worked as an arts journalist, a fiction reviewer, and a graphic designer. She’s also a published poet, with two books of poetry: adrift, a rowboat (Open Field Press, 2021) and Walk through Paradise Backwards (Slate Roof Press, 2004). In 2010, she participated in the War and Peace Project, in which over two dozen artists made 750 collages on pages of a Soviet edition of Leo Tolstoy’s novel War and Peace. The project was exhibited at the Moscow Book Festival and—through Yasnaya Polyana, Tolstoy’s summer estate, now museum—in Tula, Russia, as well as at various venues in the US, including Hampden Gallery at UMASS/Amherst, and The New School in New York City. In 2016, Crapo led a collage-making workshop based on poet Alice Notley’s fans at the Massachusetts Poetry Festival in Salem, Massachusetts. She participated in Kolaj Institute’s in-person Carnival as Folklore residency in February 2026 and presented with colleague Missy-Marie Montgomery on their poetry and collage project at Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2024. Crapo and Montgomery’s poetry/collage book, Piecing Together a Broken World, presents 30 collages with 30 poems in a “call and response” format. Learn more on Instagram @trishcrapo.
Jackson Heights, New York, USA. Christine Karapetian‘s work includes collage, assemblage and monoprints, all of which rely on a shared process: the dialogue between intuition, thinking and the accidental. In 2025 she was included in “Ink, Press, Repeat: National Juried Printmaking and Book Arts Exhibition” at William Paterson University Galleries, Paterson, New Jersey and “RE-BOP! Obstructions and Disruptions” at Beverly Arts Center, Chicago, Illinois, an exhibit partly culled from inclusion in Cut Me Up Issue 15: Obstructions & Disruptions. With Kolaj Institute, she took part in Collage Artist Residency Scotland: Folklore, Place & Collage in Fall 2023 and is enrolled in Kolaj Institute’s Artist Development program. Work she curated as part of the Curating Collage Workshop was featured in Kolaj 42 and her artist portfolio was presented in Kolaj 40. At Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025, she took part in the Special Agent Collage Collective’s Locative Kolaj project. Learn more at the Kolaj Magazine Artist Directory, at www.christinekarapetian.com, and on Instagram @karapetianchristine.
Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland. 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 Poster 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 and at Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025. 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.
Portland, Oregon, USA. Kirk Read is the author of How I Learned to Snap, which was an American Library Association Honor Book. He co-leads the Pacific Northwest Collage Collective. His collage has been seen in Contemporary Collage Magazine, Cut Me Up, RFD, Khora and Collage Artist Trading Cards, Pack 10. He co-curated “NO/STALGIA”, an international collage exhibition of over 80 artists and “What Remains Now”, a group show of Portland collage artists. His solo show, “You Should Have Gotten Here Sooner,” was at Replicant in Portland in 2025. He co-organized the Radical Faerie Arts Festival and created the solo performance shows “This is the Thing” and “Computer Face”. He toured with Sister Spit and the Sex Workers Art Show. He has been organizing artists and writers in Portland since 2020. With Kolaj Institute, he had work included in “Amuse-Bouche” at LeMieux Galleries in 2024 and 2025 and “Big Orange Monster”. He was the editor in chief at Virginia’s statewide LGBT monthly and has published writing in hundreds of newspapers, magazines and anthologies. He lives in Portland and works as a registered nurse with homeless people detoxing from street drugs. Learn more on Linktr.ee @kirkread and on Instagram @anotherkirkread.