Modern Man

 Alarm Clock Man

Collage on paper, 2017

Scissor Man

Collage on paper, 2017

Telephone Man

Collage on paper, 2017

Television Man

Collage on paper, 2017

Here's some pieces form a collage series I'm currently working on.  I really, really hate writing (and reading) artist's statements, so instead of that, I'll try to give a brief discussion of these that avoids all the artspeak.

A few months ago, I bought a set of language development flash cards at a thrift store. I've always liked bland, documentary photos, and the grainy B&W shots of mundane objects on these cards appealed to me. They sat in my studio for a while, then I got inspired, and started making these.

I'm pulling inspiration from several places: The photos reminded me a little of new wave/punk era record cover design,  particularly old Throbbing Gristle single sleeves (click here for an example), and they became a big influence on these. Early 20th century European graphic design and collage is another influence (Gustav Klutsis, El Lissitzky, etc.). Another big influence is contemporary Japanese graphic design. I've been looking at a couple of blogs recently that feature a lot of this work, and I'm fascinated at how it seems to subvert the basic design rules while simultaneously adhering to them. This inspiration led me to put intentionally irritating elements into these pieces, like the clashing op art background elements.

The text is a combination of English and Japanese, taken from old magazines. As I've discussed previously, I use text in collages fairly often, but usually as a graphic element. Text in a collage too often becomes a caption, and it's the visuals that should carry the message. I'm using Japanese and English for the visual variety, and as a nod to Japanese graphic design as an influence. The red and white is a slight nod to the De Stijl Dutch art movement.

Scissor Man was the first one of these I made, and while I was making it, the XTC song of the same name became my earworm, and the provisional title.  Televesion Man came next, so of course, the Talking Heads song became an earworm.  I toyed for a bit with only making collages that could be titled with song titles ending in 'man' (Telephone Man is a song I remember from childhood, but it's not really a song I liked), but quickly gave that up, as it proved to be too limiting. I couldn't think of good titles, however (always an issue with me), so while thinking about the provisional 'man' titles, remembered Barney Bubbles' great cover for Elvis Costello's Get Happy album, in particular the inner sleeve. This got me thinking about the sometwhat out of favor and vaguely sexist but still employed use of the word 'man' when referring to humanity, and I knew I had my titles.

I've made over a dozen of these so far, and will keep going until I run out of cards or ideas, whichever comes first. You can see enlarged prints of two of these collages at the Moraine Vally Faculty Exhibition, which opens next week.