Artful Compost Revisited

Just Sayin'
Jo Reimer
7.5 x 7.5
mixed media collage with painted papers

I keep a small basket of 7.5" substrates, mostly 140# and 300# weight, to use for collage. A full sheet of watercolor paper tears down to this size with no waste. When I travel I can grab a few sheets and toss them into a box of "compost" along with scissors, a tearing ruler, and glue so I have something to play with when the mood strikes.

I've talked before about my compost and if you click the link above you'll see some pictures of some of my compost piles. My blog header is a photo of a pile of compost in my studio. I'm not talking about making rich dirt. My compost consists of paper, piles of paper which I've painted and dyed and printed in various ways. I call it compost because as I search my piles and boxes of paper it all becomes a jumble of color that often suggests new, rich uses.

I don't use much ephemera or other commercially printed paper in my collage practice, preferring to paint original papers so that the artwork I create is completely my own. The painted papers add a complexity that I can't get from commercially printed papers. Most images in my work are my own photos or drawings. I don't see anything wrong with appropriated images when they're transformed in some way by the artist using them; it's just not my way of working.

Have you started your own compost pile? It's satisfying... like Just Sayin'.



Choose + Integrity = journal pages

I took my box of compost and some Mod Podge to the beach and managed to extract 2 collages from the collection of paper ephemera. I didn't
know where I was heading with either one but just kept putting colors together to see what came of it. Choose just happened. I used part of some papers I made years ago, literally in the dark.

In a painting class we students were instructed to bring all sorts of non-painting things, arrange them in front of us within easy reach, and put a big sheet of paper was on the easel. Then the teacher turned the lights out, leaving us totally in the dark, and told us to start painting with the materials in front of us.

I don't remember all that I had to work with but I do know that the collection included turmeric, lipstick, eye shadow, and some other kitchen stuff. The painting was really ugly but I've used parts of it in many collages since then, and part of it is what I used here, in the upper left section. The picture of shoppers in an old fashioned store reminds us to choose wisely. And once I started thinking about the night I was choosing non-painting things, my constant choosing of what I eat and don't eat, and my constant choosing between right and wrong the piece came together quickly.

Integrity came together from a prints of another piece coupled with some images from a newspaper that was masked with tissue. The woman is a photo of my mother as a young woman. She and Dad came home from work one afternoon to find that their house had burned to the ground, along with all their possessions. It was during the Great Depression and their situation was dire. Her brother who owned a drug store in PA paid their way north, gave them each a good paying job, and a place to live for the next three years. This of Mother and one of the city crowds by another brother, a newspaper photographer in NYC, seems to tell the story of a frightened young wife with nothing but hope that the future would bring better times. You can faintly see "storyteller" and "catch a glimpse" as well as people reaching up as though they're asking God to step into a tough situation and lift them up. I think Mother would have liked this collage.

Buried Treasure- Getting Serious About Collage

Today is Buried Treasure Day, when Seth, at The Altered Page asked friends to post their own personal favorite blog posting. My favorite isn't a post on my own blog but rather it's an article I wrote 9 years ago for an online 'zine called The Muse with a short intro by the editor. Here it is:

Getting Serious About CollageBy Jo ReimerMay 2000

Following is an artistically inspirational article written by Jo Reimer. It is accompanied by several of her previously unpublished collages both here and in the gallery. When I asked Jo about them she said that they were "practice" collages and she was very off-hand about them. Perhaps greatness doesn't always recognize itself.

Question: I've been working on my very first collage and I have questions about where to go from here. What does one mount to paper? How do I get that soft hazy look? How can I make the elements look like they belong together, like there's a connection?

Answer: Just keep working. Work some more. Work some more. Work at it every day, if you can, and if you can't do that at least make time to approach your art work 2 or 3 times a week. Consider nothing as precious. Few pieces of paper are precious. Adhesives and paint can be replaced; there's more where that came from, so use it, whatever it is. When you look at something you've done and are scared to take the next step, take it anyway.

I've just started drawing and my teacher told me to feel good about every bad drawing I make because I'm that much closer to drawing the way I'm intended to draw. He said we each have thousands of bad drawings in us blocking the way for the good work to get out, so it's really important to do lots of ugly work and get it out of my system. I believe that. I've done some hideous work, but once in a while something good squeaks its way to the surface to surprise me and encourage me that this is the right road to travel.

Some of the questions that beginners ask has to do with composition which we learn by doing and by studying what others have done. Good collages usually are made up of elements which relate to each other in some way. They may be related in color, theme, imagery. They may be formally composed, i.e. done strictly with attention to design elements of line, form, shape, and so on,or they may be narrative, (tell a story).

Have you taken a Basic Design course? Enroll in Basic Design at a university or at an art center and tell the instructor that your primary interest is collage. A collage workshop might be the way to go for someone who's experienced in other kinds of art. Check with local schools, art supply stores, art guilds, or look for collage courses at Arts and Crafts schools such as Penland, Haystack, or Arrowmont. You'll find workshop information in art magazines such as American Artist, Fiberarts, Watercolorist. Learning good composition comes both from working and from careful observation. Get an idea of what's being done by attending exhibitions at museums and galleries. Read books about collage.

As you look and read ask yourself questions about the work you're seeing: What's the background? How is it prepared? What is applied to this surface? Where does the color come from? What is the artist conveying? Is there a story or is it formal design? Why is some work in the middle of the page while in other pieces the artist worked out to the edges? What is the compositional structure? Do I like this work and why or why not?

Start making what I call Collage-A-Day. Using a journal or cardstock cut to 5 ½ X 8 ½ make one collage every day. Work fast, spending no more than 15 minutes on each collage. Use no more than 5 elements. Look and consider before you glue everything down, but don't agonize over it. You'll just naturally get better as you become more experienced. Remember that bad art I told you to get out of your system! Set up a small space where you can do this. You'll need scissors, glue, your substrate (journal or cardstock) and scraps of paper which could include junk mail, magazine pages, photos, decorative papers, pattern tissue, wrapping papers, street papers. That's all you really need.Start collecting collage elements. A collage artist by necessity becomes a collector of ephemera. While you might start with junk mail you'll learn to ransack magazines for appealing images and blocks of color and text. Eventually you'll want to add a wide variety of quality papers and you may want to paint or dye your papers, or even create handmade paper to use in your work.And you'll need to go through the glue selection process. There are dozens, maybe hundreds of adhesives available to use. One good basic glue mix is 1 part white glue plus 1 part acrylic matte medium, applied with a brush. Each artist will tell you something different, and you'll learn that you have your preferences for different purposes. You may want to use UHU glue sticks for your Collage-A-Day work.

Supports-substrates-backings can vary, also. Heavy cardstock works, as do other heavy papers. 140# to 300# watercolor paper is great for special work. Cardboard is stiff enough but has so much acid in it that it's not recommended for work you want to give or sell.Now, go to work. Work some more. Work some more. Jump in and do it. Enjoy the process of working and have a good time.

Compost

Perhaps you'd like to see what my Compost piles look like, the ones in the studio, not the big one in the garden. The first photo shows the contents of one of 3 large plastic Compost-to-go boxes, 10" x 14" x 4" boxes with a hinged lid.

The second photo is looking down into one of the large drawers in my work table. You'll notice that there aren't a lot of magazine pages or ephemera in my boxes other than those that somehow relate directly to my life.

Although I once worked with appropriated images torn from whatever books or magazines I came upon I didn't find that to be very satisfying for my more serious work, and I felt that the resulting work could have been done by anyone. So I started preparing my own collage papers and using my own photographs as well as those of family and friends. I do love using ephemera in my travel journals; these bits and pieces of papers collected on location add so much about the place I'm visiting as I work in my journal.

Who Are You?

When I began this blog my intention was to post once or twice each week and show you some of my weeks worth of work. I'm finding that's easier said than done. I've been IN the studio, working quite often, but most of the results aren't what I want to show the world, but I'll show you a couple of works.

Blue Door is more realistic than I usually paint but I had a photo I liked and gave it a try. I like doing little watercolors like this in my sketchbooks or journals but as an acrylic painting it just doesn't work for me. I'd like to be more abstract but this is what came out that day. Mother would like it! I didn't; so I quit trying and we took off for a couple of vacation days the beach where I played with my collage papers and had some fun. I turned one of the collages into an illustration that fits into a continuing series which I call Sermon Notes. Here's Who Are You?

I usually take copious notes during the sermon on Sunday mornings because our pastors' messages often speak directly to my heart. Some time back I decided to turn these notes into art. This is number 32. All are done on a 9" X 12" 140# block of smooth watercolor paper. I use a block for a substrate for this series because it stays nice and tight while I add the layers of paper, glue, paint,ink, stenciling, stamps, and lettering. Otherwise a loose sheet of paper would buckle with the glue and water and because of the tension exerted by the papers as they dry. When I cut the finished piece off the block my rough edges are preserved and the finished piece is flat. Of course this means that I had to buy several blocks so that I can have more than one collage going at once. That's just for the Sermon Notes; other times I work on stretched canvas, board, or heavier watercolor paper.

I prepare collage papers ahead of time, often during dry spells when I feel uninspired to work on a specific project, or in the evening when my energy lags, or even when I'm working in a room with other people and can't concentrate on making art. I use all sorts of paper for collage: art tissue, text-weight paper, various washi (Japanese rice paper), unwaxed sandwich paper, or other relatively thin papers. Color is added to the paper in many forms: fabric dye and paint, acrylic paint for crafts and artist grade, watercolor, ink, pastels, watercolor crayons and pencils, and anything else that has color.

I keep my papers in drawers and in portable tubs and refer to them as my Compost. I continually stir the pile of papers, tear them into pieces, and generally keep them well mixed because the juxtapositioning of color against color often suggests a new direction and feeds the growth of my work.

My favorite adhesive is acrylic medium mixed with PVA applied with a plastic palette knife. The finished work gets a finish coat of acrylic medium and acrylic varnish.