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FROM THE ARTIST DIRECTORY
Originality & Complexity
Quebec, Canada. Andrée-Anne Guay’s collages celebrate the beauty of the universe in all its originality and complexity. Mainly composed of archival documents, her colorful illustrations are a praise of the world’s diversity. Her work seeks to illuminate households and to put joy in people’s hearts. MORE
COLLAGE COMMUNITIES
Sociedad Argentina de Collage
Founded in 2019 by Urko, Poli Perez, Sergio Artaola, and Shavi Alli, Sociedad Argentina de Collage was born out of the need for a collective that represents local collage artists. What sets them apart from other groups is their federal mission. The intention is to empower local artists by allowing embassies to be created spontaneously with the autonomy to carry out activities according to their possibilities and context. The image is Diálogo de maeriales by member Wally Griffiths. MORE
*Featured in The International Directory of Collage Communities by Kolaj Institute. LEARN MORE
COLLAGE BOOKS
Tender
By Linden Eller (self-published, 2019). These pieces were made during Linden’s five year nomadic season. She traveled with paper, a small pouch of fragments, a glue stick, a needle, and cotton thread. Places she unpacked long enough to create in: France, India, Australia, New Zealand, Samoa, Japan, and Morocco. MORE
FROM KOLAJ 30
Language, Literature, & Collage
Jackson's Hole, Wyoming's Gisele Olson comes at collage from studying English literature. While working on her Masters, a professor invited her to submit a creative project in lieu of a typical paper. "I made what would become the first in a group of seven stitch-collaged paper dolls that reflect/critique the historically nocuous influence of western medicine and psychoanalysis on women and their minds/bodies," recalled Olson. While cultural critique remains a cornerstone of her work, she has since moved on to working with vintage postcards. A portfolio of Olson's work appears in Kolaj 30. MORE
A portfolio of Olson’s work appears in Kolaj 30. To see the complete Artist Portfolio, SUBSCRIBE to Kolaj Magazine or Get a Copy of the Issue.
COLLAGE BOOKS
The Arthritic Grasshopper
By Gisele Prassinos, illustrated by Allan Kausch (Wakefield Press; 2017). Transgressive humor, coy menace, and a pervading sense of threatened feminine identity within a hostile world. This book gathers together an assortment of anxious dream tales drawn from literary journals and plaquettes, introduced and illustrated by such admirers as Paul Éluard, Man Ray, and Hans Bellmer. MORE
FROM THE ARTIST DIRECTORY
Graceful Linear Vistas
Boise, Idaho, USA. Lorelle Rau’s harmonious compositions piece together snippets of found paper and captured imagery to create graceful linear vistas and abstract scenes that coordinate color, texture, and shape with balanced intention. Rau’s recent series, “20 Seconds,” defines her reality during the COVID19 pandemic as obscure and contradicting. Unburdened by social and financial responsibilities, not much changed in her daily routine, yet the lack of accessibility and freedom was confining. For her this experience was a matter of inconvenience; for others it was life and death. MORE
COLLAGE ON VIEW
Mending the Sky
at the New Orleans Museum of Art in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA through 31 January 2021. The exhibition brings together eleven artists’ projects that respond to a world turned upside down. The exhibition takes its title from a Chinese fable in which a rip in the sky causes the earth to split open, bringing floods, fires, famine, and disease—until a goddess comes to take on the arduous task of mending the broken sky. Each of the artworks in the exhibition help give shape to the aftermath of calamity, building towards a more equitable future by helping to envision the new world that might rise in the wake of crisis. MORE
KOLAJ LIVE ONLINE
Collage Communities Forum
Saturday, November 21st, 2020
1PM EST/10AM PST
Collage is unique in the larger art world in that communities and collectives play an important role in the production and promotion of the art form. Collage groups organize exhibitions, run online calls to artists, facilitate exchange across borders. In this virtual forum, leaders of collage communities in North America, Europe, and Latin America will share their experience bringing artists and collage enthusiasts together. Collage Communities Forum is presented by Kolaj Institute in conjunction with the launch of the International Directory of Collage Communities. MORE
Recent Publications
NEW BOOK
The International Directory of Collage Communities
The 104-page book is a survey of collage networks, guilds, communities, and projects as well as online efforts and groups focused on collage research. For each community, the directory presents their key activities, mission, how to join, and a bit of their history. Copious images illustrate the book. MORE
The International Directory of Collage Communities is sent automatically to members of the Silver Scissors & Golden Glue Societies and those who join before 23 November 2020. These special subscribers support the work of Kolaj Institute while receiving an item from Kolaj each month. JOIN TODAY!
(The Directory will ship to purchasers and members of the Golden Glue & Silver Scissors Societies the week of 9 November 2020.)
Our goal with every issue is that Kolaj Magazine is essential reading for anyone interested in the role of contemporary collage in art, culture, and society. We not only hope you enjoy the articles and images in Kolaj #30, we hope it takes you somewhere you never knew existed.
SUBSCRIBE OR ORDER A COPY
CURRENT ISSUE
KOLAJ #30
From the island of Cuba to the tip of South America, to Norway and Denmark then back across the Atlantic to North America, Kolaj #30 is a journey through the hearts and minds of the collage community. These artists are responding to social upheaval, questioning the function of the photographic image, repurposing old billboards, encouraging children to engage with art, making new festivals, telling stories about their communities, reflecting on personal histories, imagining cities, and intervening on the urban landscape. MORE
BOOK
Radical Reimaginings
The curators of the 96-page book invited artists who use collage in their practice to put forward a work of art that offers a visual narrative that speaks to the unprecedented change unfolding in 2020. An essay by Ric Kasini Kadour reflects upon collage's unique ability to imagine new realities. Forty artists from nine countries and multiple Indigenous peoples—Salish-Kootenai/Métis-Cree/Sho-Ban, Tlingit/Nisga’a, Oglala/Lakota, and Seneca Nation—offer a variety of perspectives. The voices of Black, Latinx, Native, and white Americans mingle with those from Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Argentina, Canada, France, and Germany. Artwork is accompanied by a statement in which the artists describe how they want to reimagine the world. MORE
PUBLICATION
Collage Magic
by Emma Anna
Part autobiography, part fantasy, Emma Anna’s vision of The New Old World (aka The NOW) fuses vintage ephemera with modern imaging technologies. Emma shapes this strange world by using the pen tool from Adobe Photoshop as her magic wand, in the process declaring herself to be a “collage magician”. Part artist book, part document of art making, Collage Magic, from La Casa Verde Editions, is Emma Anna’s journey through magic and art. MORE
BOOK
Revolutionary Paths
When the collage is presented in exhibition, it is often done so without the critical framework granted other mediums. In "Revolutionary Paths: Critical Issues in Collage", exhibition curator Ric Kasini Kadour presents examples of collage that represent various aspects and takes on the medium. Each work in the exhibition represents the potential for deeper inquiry and further curatorial exploration of the medium. MORE
BOOK
Cultural Decontructions
Collage is unique as a medium in that it uses as its material artifacts from the world itself. To harvest those fragments, the artist must first deconstruct culture; they must select, cut, and remove the elements they do not wish to use and then reconstruct work that tells a new story. In "Cultural Deconstructions: Critical Issues in Collage", exhibition curator Ric Kasini Kadour presents examples of collage artists who are deconstructing identity as a way to critique culture. MORE
Our goal with every issue is that Kolaj Magazine is essential reading for anyone interested in the role of contemporary collage in art, culture, and society. Each issue of Kolaj Magazine is dedicated to reviewing and surveying contemporary collage with an international perspective. We are interested in collage as a medium, a genre, a community, and a 21st century art movement.
