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COLLAGE ON VIEW
L(and)
Todd Bartel at Room 83 Spring in Watertown, Massachusetts, USA through 30 November 2020. Unified by an examination of the history of the American landscape and its interrelationship with the history of collage, Todd Bartel balances content and narrative with a marriage of materials and the principles of abstraction. Actions abound; add and subtract, cut, paste, saw, join, paint, borrow, bleed, and steal, all in service to the visually provocative whole. Muted tones and intricate detail reveal layers of meaning, erasures and negative spaces speak volumes. MORE
FROM KOLAJ 30
Destroy the Myth
In June 2020, when the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. announced the acquisition of I See Red: Target by Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, the statement proclaimed it to be “the first painting by a Native American artist to enter the collection." In Kolaj 30, Editor Ric Kasini Kadour reflects on the National Gallery's historic acquisition, the role of museums, how collage facilitates conversation between cultures, and why it is important to see Smith's work as a collage. MORE
FROM THE ARTIST DIRECTORY
An Outdoor Theater
Hurley, New York, USA. Amy Talluto creates landscape compositions that live in a realm of memory, color and fantasy. She works with unique and personified natural forms, treating them as characters on a kind of stage. In her work, trees and undergrowth can seemingly come to life and become actors within an outdoor theater. Collage allows Talluto to move away from realism and penetrate further into the psychological memory of a specific place and time. MORE
COLLAGE ON VIEW
Proximate Magic
Elizabeth Castaldo at the Board Room & Gallery at Saint Joseph's College in Patchogue, New York, USA through 10 December 2020. Through her mixed media works, Castaldo explores the relationships between nature and the feminine. Moving beyond the oft quoted spiritual relationship, she explores the political aspects of the confluence of women’s and environmental issues. Her work employs combinations of drawing, printmaking, collage and paper cutting in works that are deep with meaning. For the work in this show, Castaldo uses mixed media, collage, and printmaking to push the limits of pattern and layering. MORE
FROM KOLAJ 30
Paper Mingles with Gloops of Paint
Shreds of torn paper mingle with gloops of paint. A dull pink spills over the pixelated pattern of a black and white security envelope. A pool of mauve forms a hard edge against a pointed piece of black. For all its thick materiality, Ice Cream Castle by Patti Robinson is atmospheric in composition and non-representational of its subject. MORE
A portfolio of Robinson’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 Micturating Angel
By Xtian (Gadzooxtian Productions, 2020). Playing with the conventions of comics to create striking visuals, adventures revealed through non-linear story-telling and complete nonsense dialogue, the scattings of a madman leading his visual orchestra, The Micturating Angel is a unique comic that will never be completely understood by anyone, thus remaining an enduring mystery. Look beyond the confusion, don’t worry about trying to make sense of it, and revel in this ever-shifting series of nightmares, laid out like the storyboard of a Hollywood blockbuster that will never be made. MORE
COLLAGE FORUM
How-To Kolaj
Sunday, December 6, 2020 @ 1PM EST
At Kolaj Magazine, we are often asked by artists how to be featured in the magazine or how to list an exhibition or how to get a book listed on Collage Books. In this forum, Editor and Publisher of Kolaj Magazine Ric Kasini Kadour will walk attendees through the various ways in which one can both submit to the magazine and be featured. Kadour will offer a brief presentation, after which he will take questions about the magazine, upcoming events, and various initiatives and projects. He will offer some pointers that will help your submission both be seen and be successful. MORE
Recent Publications
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NEW BOOK
Unfamiliar Vegetables: Variations in Collage
Unfamiliar Vegetables is a collection of collage where each of the fifty artists interpreted, in their own way, Carlotta Bonnecaze’s 1892 Carnival float design Familiar Vegetables. Project organizer Christopher Kurts observed, “Unfamiliar Vegetables is an experiment in controlled chaos….tiny variations within each artist’s creative sphere accumulate until the outcomes are as unique as the people creating them.” MORE
Unfamiliar Vegetables is sent automatically to members of the Silver Scissors & Golden Glue Societies and those who join before 31 December 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 December 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
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
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
BOOK
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.
