Another Day of Collage

Today didn't proceed as swimmingly as yesterday, (possibly because I used fewer food photos?), but I completed all 16 basic exercises in Clare's instructions. There are hints on how to do more, different things, but I think I'll take a break, and observe the 46 collages I did in the last four days. In class, some students were coloring in, adding, subtracting to the collages they've completed, and I might want to try these, or, observe and find out more about what I've already done. And weave.

I found the first two terribly difficult. The idea is to cut up a photo into small squares and remove some but maintain the original "picture". First, removing any piece appeared as if I took away an important piece; then once I got started I wanted to remove almost all of them. When I paid attention to the shape of the negative space, some pieces needed to come back in to make the overall picture attractive.

With this one, I wanted to leave in many of the dark piece in the lower right corner.


I also worked on some of Lynne's photograph.

Is this my favorite of the four because of the colors?

Alas, no, I love the B/W and the "scene" I see here. As well, I like the band of bright lights one third of the way from the top; it gives a great focal point, secondary only to the person.

Negative of B/W, and you can see the shape of the band of light looks like land, and below, water. Almost Monet-esque. But even though I changed the blade tip, this picture didn't cut cleanly, and I was so unhappy, I decided not to do any more collages. But I did some photoshopping.

I'm learning that, like anything else, (drawing!) it pays to stick with collage so that I can improve on the technique and be able to put in a little bit of me into what I do, to really enjoy what I'm doing. When I'm there, I can get into the moment and not worry about how this is going to help my weaving, or weighting out if I should be making collages or weaving.

I think, I hope, my mind is ticking even after I finish the work for the day. I keep looking at them and going back to them, and not exactly thinking about them specifically, but they don't leave me for a while. The last three nights I've preferred to watch mindless television for a couple of hours in preference to good shows, or reading, and though I'm not aware of it, my mind seems to be thinking about the collages. Only after a couple of hours of watching, or having the TV on but not exactly watching, can I read.

Strange but wonderful. But then it's autumn here, and nothing can possibly go wrong!