PAPIERS COLLÉS
Analog collage / Papiers collés - French term translated as glued paper.
Henri Matisse described the collage as "drawing with scissors". You can talk about collages endlessly. Approaches to its creation and technique are very diverse. Features of modern collage - ephemeral. Collage is the result of value thinking: a collage artist is able to see the value in what has no value for anyone: in old magazines, newspapers, pieces of colored paper, music, books, old photos, maps, wallpaper…
An application is an action that involves stacking cut or torn pieces of paper on top of each other and gluing them together on a solid base. But in this method you can use different approaches. For example, the Dadaists in the early 20th century did not care at all about the design of their collages - the artist climbed a ladder and threw down sheets of colored paper, which were glued to the base in the position in which they landed. Of course, almost all artists pay much attention to the principles of design - line, shape, texture, color. Also, they do not avoid the creation of unity, variability, balance and rhythm.
ASSEMBLAGE
Assemblage is a technique of arranging disparate elements, whole objects, or their details. Today, the collage artists collect not only emotions, impressions and interesting samples of paper, but also objects that seem interesting to them. And this feature makes their works truly unique and unexpected.
Artists working in this technique use found or prepared materials for the collage, such as paper of all kinds, acrylic and watercolor paints, any small objects or their fragments - in short, everything that can be glued to a rigid base. Not only that, sometimes collagists use real garbage in their work. Therefore, the beauty and value of these objects is shown through collage art.
The use of the assemblage as an approach to the creation of art dates back to the cubist constructions of Pablo Picasso, three-dimensional works, which he began to do in 1912. In 1918, Dadaist artist Kurt Schwitters began using cleaned scrap to create collages and assemblies - he called this technique «merz». The assemblage was the basis for many surreal objects.
Inspired by the work of psychologist Sigmund Freud on the unconscious and dreams, surrealist artists often made unlikely combinations of found objects to create amazing compositions.
DECOLLAGE
Décollage as a visual technique is a method of creating works of art by removing rather than adding elements. Parts of the pasted posters are separated and removed, as a result of which the lower layers appear and become part of the new image. The French word "décollage" translates literally as "take-off" or "become detached."
Wolf Vostell found the word "décollage" while reading the newspaper "Figaro" on September 6, 1954, it was used to describe the takeoff of the aircraft. The artist decided to use this term to define an aesthetic philosophy that defined a visual force that destroys worn-out values and replaces them with new ones. Artists often looked for walls with many layers of posters to make the process of décollage archeological and considered a means of revealing historical information. They exhibited their torn works from posters as aesthetic objects and social documents.
PHOTOCOLLAGE AND PHOTOMONTAGE
A photo collage is a work of art made from photographs or parts of photographs, sometimes with the addition of painted elements and inscriptions. The effect of photo collage is achieved by overlaying one image on another, combining several photo images in one, sometimes even with graphic elements or using a chaotic set of different images. During the development of photography, it became possible to use different methods of creating collages using special effects. A lot depends on the imagination of the author and his vision.
Photomontage is a process that results in the creation of a complex photograph by cutting a negative and joining a number of other negatives. Previously, this effect could be achieved by the multiple exposure method, today this method is also performed using image editing software.
Photomontage was first used as a technique by Dadaists in 1915 in protests against the First World War. It was later adopted by the Surrealists, who used the possibilities of photomontage, offering free associations to unite widely disparate images, to depict the work of the unconscious mind. For example, in the 1930s, Dora Maar's provocative photomontages became significant icons of surrealism.
Text: Elena Budnik
Visual Design/Editorial: Annete Sagal