Fabric collage -- out in public

In 2015 I did a collaborative art project with my dear friend Uta Lenk, who lives in Germany.  We each prepared six sets of fabric stuff -- one envelope to me, an identical envelope to her.  The envelopes contained three or four bits and pieces of fabric, lace, cord, maybe a button or bead, and miscellaneous things we found in our respective studios.  We exchanged the envelopes and then each month we made a fabric collage that had to use everything in the envelope plus whatever else we might want to add.  For coherence, I chose to stitch all my collages onto a neutral linen background, which in turn was stitches to the deep gray mat board.

We had fun doing the project, but on my part I would say that only four or five of the twelve rose to the level of art.  As with so many experiments in a new method or procedure, it takes a while to find your way.  But three of them seemed good enough to put in frames for the new show at PYRO Gallery.

Gold Star

Only one hitch -- Uta and I had made our collages to fit onto 8x12" mat board, and I couldn't find frames in that size.  So I got 9x12 frames and eked out the width with strips of colored paper. 

Pig Newton

If I were starting from scratch I'd prefer the mat board the same size as the frame, but the stripes do add a jaunty air, especially when all three collages are hung together.

By the way, I don't like to put fabric under glass, so I put the collages into the frames naked.  I know there are some drawbacks to this approach in that the work can get dusty, but I didn't want to pop for expensive shadowbox frames that would keep the glass forward off the 3-D collages.  I hope it works out well.

Slick Dude

If you'd like to see all our collages from that project, click here.