White Lines / Blowin' Through My Mind

[jon foster]

I wrote about sanding collages. Feel free to read and share if you dig.

https://thejonfoster.blogspot.com/2025/04/white-lines-blowin-throug...

[Jennifer Wallace]

If you look at the decollage page on Wikipedia, there's a sizeable number of French artists using it in the early 1950s. And the UK Tate galleries' website details all this:

• 'Although the first time the term décollage appeared in print was in the Dictionnaire Abrégé du Surréalisme in 1938, it is usually used in the context of nouveau réalisme. The artists involved, such as Raymond Hains, often sought out sites with many layers of posters so that the process of décollage took on an archeological character and was seen as a means of uncovering historical information. They exhibited their ripped poster artworks as aesthetic objects and social documents. From 1949 Hains made work from posters that he tore from the walls of Paris.
• In 1963 the German artist Wolf Vostell appropriated the term, staging a series of happenings under the title Nein 9 Decollagen which involved television images which he had ‘décollé’ unstuck from the screen and re-presented. In 1962 Vostell had founded Dé-coll/age: Bulletin Aktueller Ideen, a magazine devoted to the theoretical writings of artists involved in happenings, Fluxus, nouveau réalisme and pop art.'

[PATRICIA LANDON]

CORRECTION: EARLY 19TH CENTURY,sorry

[PATRICIA LANDON]

DECOLLAGE>I didn't look up the definition of the word yesterday but now I get it. For several years now I have been hesitant to alter the size of years of 8.5 x 11 art pieces. All made with ephemera from as far back as the early 9th century. I did manage to refocus the images into A-7 and A-6 cellos. Only one has the L from look magazine cover I think, lol. The result is more than 180 and 2 per cell, lots of collage for sanding and experimentation. I do wonder now other than sandpaper, what are other options? What would RAY JOHNSON DO?

[jon foster]

@ Jennifer - I love that sort of stuff. I've tried to make billboards before by living things outside, but it never really seems to work. I might try another go at it this summer and see I can get something interesting out of it.

@Bradford - thanks for sharing. I guess the overall goal is just to come up with something unique. And unique to me always looks old. I never do much with the "digital smudges" that I see much of these things becoming. What time and water does to materials is endlessly fascinating to me and because of this, I find myself constantly looking for paper that gets me at least half way there. I'm sure I'll be looking for this sort of thing later today.

Thanks again!

[Jennifer Wallace]

I know the technique from 'decollage' and as a mainstream art student saw a fellow student make a series of mixed media pieces using the technique - I vaguely remember an industrial sort of sander being used.

Décollage - Wikipedia

[Bradford]

jon,

Yes, I dig!  I've read your earlier postings about collage work and sandpaper.  When you mentioned the "happy accident" of the sanding block presenting itself for your use, the first thing I thought about was Ray Johnson.

Back in my mid-teens, I liked to antique paper with plain old, bargain brand instant tea.  I would make a solution then to prevent wrinkly, bubbly dried "antique" paper, I would dry them flat on a perforated (tiny lozenge-shaped) grill over a hanging light in the kitchen.  The surface tension of the water would keep it flat as it dried.  From their I could craft whatever result I wanted with my century-to-two-centuries-old paper.  Using a pen & ink nib, I copied letters by Benjamin Franklin to see how "authentic" I could make the document appear.

The sandpaper treatment was interesting to learn about.  I remember the scene in "How to Draw a Bunny" where this technique was mentioned.  You conveyed the result more vividly with comparing it to an old billboard, an overall "distress" that I also enjoy.  It's like it makes something venerable when it bears such evidence of survival.

Another source of collage fodder is accumulating paper stock or random mail items in a stack that is accessible to cats.  I normally live with two or three cats at a time and have found interesting scraps lying about when one of them has attacked such a stack.  I find some of these cat creations inspiring as I examine them and set aside interesting pieces for later use.  Anyhoo, that's all I can think of regarding collage process at the moment.  Thanks for sharing your ideas and . . .

Keep up the good work.

Cheers,

Bradford / FLUXUS DAKOTA