Fruit Thugs

Migrant Fruit Thugs, 2006
Fred Tomaselli
Photocollage, leaves, acrylic, gouache and resin on wood panel
78 X 96 inches
Image: James Cohan Gallery

Fred Tomaselli mixed media works incorporate a range of materials. In Migrant Fruit Thugs, the leaves are from fig trees in his Brooklyn garden. Sitting stolidly amongst these leaves and the starry night in the background are two boldly colored birds of no real species, but an imagined species. The combination of these elements creates a unique somewhat fantasy-like feeling.

Any dimension is obviously lost in through digitization but the dimension you would see in person may also be a different experience than expected, knowing materials. Tomaselli seals his collages in resin and layers of varnish, flattening the immediate surface.

"Where Art Imitates Gardening (and Vice Versa)"
Dorothy Spears, NY Times 10/8/06

The Block

The Block, 1971
Romare Bearden (American, 1911-1988)
Cut and pasted printed, colored and metallic papers, photostats, pencil, ink marker, gouache, watercolor, and pen and ink on Masonite; overall: 48 x 216 in.
Image: metmuseum.org six panels, each: 48 x 36 in.

A variety of collage materials including cut paper, newspaper, fabric are mixed with printing techniques and drawing. By incorporating images from current magazines and newspapers a direct element of reality is included in the overall composition. The image here is rather small, either click on the title for zooming capabilities or look even more closely here or check out individual panels on the Met's timeline .

This work is the subject of a fantastic example of an online multimedia presentation. Romare Bearden: Let's Walk the Block is dedicated to the exploration of this wonderful work from biography to curator descriptions of the work to accompanying jazz music (one of Bearden's inspirations and represented in much of his work). The Block is a tribute to Harlem, each panel representing an aspect of the neighborhood in NYC.

Collage

Guitar, after March 31, 1913
Pablo Picasso (Spanish, 1881-1973)
Museum of Modern Art (967.1979)
Image: moma.org
Cut-and-pasted paper and printed paper, charcoal, ink, and chalk on colored paper on board, 26 1/8 x 19 1/2"

Collage is a fascinating technique in art, one I've found myself drawn to in my own work. I intend to focus this week's art on collage, with an attempt to highlight a great range of work. From torn pieces of paper seemingly randomly arranged to obviously deliberate constructions, collage provides the viewer with a dimensional experience. Most of us have memories of making collages in art class as children, oftentimes limited to cut or torn pieces of construction paper, yet how these individual shapes and pieces are placed and arranged on a "canvas" can lead to a wold of wondrous possibilities, from abstraction to representation. Collage began as an artist's technique in the 20th century so bear with me on the century limits for this week.

I'll start the week off with one of the artist's that is debated to be the inventor of the technique, Picasso. Click on the title, Guitar, and get the chance to zoom in the image, a better way to see the lines and detail of the collage.

Website dedicated to the art of collage, collageart.org

Depth of Image

Collage, 1929
Joan Miro Spanish (1893-1983)
Conté crayon, gouache, ink, flocked paper, newspaper, abrasive cloth, and various papers on flocked paper, 28 5/8 x 42 3/4"
Museum of Modern Art

I am simply blown away by the online exhibition
of a current MoMA exhibition , Joan Miro: Painting and Anti-Painting. First alerted to the show by a beautiful catalog received at work I meant to find a Miro for my blog. I promptly forgot as I am wont to do with the amount of art I see on a daily basis, but a search for a Magritte painting (which will surely come along after not too long) brought me to Miro and here we are (you just love to hear my pathways to selection don't you? :). Miro has been a favorite of mine since I was a child. His colorful, abstract and surrealistic paintings were always a draw for me, one of my favorite museums on my European tour in college was the Fundacio Joan Miro in Barcelona. As I got older I wasn't as sure, but some time spent with my broader art knowledge as well as exposure to a greater selection of Miro's oeuvre (drawings, collages etc.) my love for, appreciation and understanding of Miro grew.

I intended on sharing one of the colorful, rich paintings, but a perusal of the online exhibition encouraged me to share a work that showcases what museums are doing with images online and in turn focus more on the "Anti-Painting" part of the exhibition. Collages are wonderfully dimensional, something that is often difficult to get any grasp of unless you see it in person. The large images and zoom function are fantastic. You can see the ragged edges and wrinkles of the paper. The online exhibition also incorporates works that are not a part of the physical exhibition (a great way to complete a theme, discussion etc. as it is often the case that desired works could not be used for the show for various reasons, this particular work is not in the exhibition).

Another fantastic aspect of the online exhibition is the ability to present a group of works in more than one grouping. MoMA has presented the works as series (by both medium and subject), a chronology, an index, and most interesting of all by size. You can easily scroll through these rows, click on a work of interest, increase its size and read it's "wall label".

I've went on for a bit, haven't said anything about the collage! Check out the online exhibition and have fun! (It definitely works better in the full screen version).