Collage shortcuts

It's time to show another making of. The work went quite easily, because I wanted to do something with this dog who originally hold a pair of slippers in his mouth, an image I like because it illustrates - in my opinion - many of my fellow citizens I hesitated when he was dressed with his red shirt - I thought he looked just gorgeous and blissfully happy. But then I felt that his joy had no object, so I gave him - like the Creator - a mate. And, of course, there is more than that in this collage, but you'll have to find it out by yourself.

Français
Il est temps de montrer une fois encore ma cuisine interne. Ce collage fut assez aisé, car je partais du chien tenant une paire de charentaises dans sa gueule. Un thème qui m'est cher car il illustre, à mon avis, la passivité et docilité de mes contemporains. Quand il eut sa chemise rouge, je me disais que je pouvais m'arrêter là, tellement il avait l'air mignon et béat. Mais je trouvais que sa joie était sans objet et je décidai- comme le Créateur - de lui adjoindre une compagne. Et, bien entendu, il y davantage que cela dans ce collage, mais je vous laisse le soin de le découvrir tout seuls.

The other day, I have made a collage

which enchanted me and at the same time estranged me. I was the fact that the girl’s face and the horse’s eye merged so perfectly, so that I saw her moving the animal’s head away from her face like a mask. The whole figure looks so natural while it is made from different bits. Reading Hal Foster’s book on Compulsive beauty, I was struck by his comment on Hans Bellmer’s dolls, which are really the extreme limit of deconstruction-reconstruction, as other works from provocative artists (at Saatchi's for ex.). The author shows that Breton never went so far, that he maintained a limit, that he couldn’t sacrifice sublimation. I must say that I understand that, even if my works are often at the limit of deconstruction, or chaos. But art in my eyes has to do with order. What I see in this collage is that I have succeeded in making it “beautiful” and nevertheless uncanny, but in a light way. So it is a resting point in my moreoften agitated production and I dedicate it to my granddaughter Julia (7) and to the moments of pure happiness during childhood, moments when one is unified and which we run desperately after when we have become adults.

French:
Etrangeté
L'autre jour, j'ai fait un collage qui m'a à la fois enchanté et surpris. Cela provenait de la fusion du visage de la fille et de l'oeil du cheval - j'ai vu le mouvement d'éloignement de la tête de l'animal, comme si la fille enlevait un masque. Toute cette figure a l'air si naturelle, bien que composée de différents fragments. Comme je suis en train de lire le livre susmentionné, sur la beauté compulsive des surréalistes, j'ai fait le lien avec ce qu'on y dit sur les poupées de Hans Bellmer, qui constituent l'extrême limite de la déconstruction-reconstruction, tout comme dans les oevres-choc de certains artistes contemporains (par ex. chez Saatchi). L'auteur écrit que Breton ne voulait jamais franchir la limite, car il pensait que l'art devait sublimer. Je dois dire que cela me parle, même si mes oeuvres sont souvent à la limite de la déconstruction, donc du chaos. Mais l'art, à von avis, met en oeuvre un certain ordre. Ce que je vois dans mon collage est que j'ai réussi à le rendre beau et en même temps dérangeant (unheimlich), mais de manière légère. C 'est donc un point de repos dans ma production souvent agitée et je le dédie à ma petite-fille Julia (7 ans) et aux moments de pur bonheur de l'enfance, quand on est unifié et que nous essayons de revivre désespérément plus tard quand nous sommes devenus adultes.

I had been quite satisfied with this state, so I sent it to a family member, asking him to comment on it. His answer was very negative. After a moment of stupor, I realized that maybe I had been too illustrative and that this collage needed some more work. You can see by yourself what came out. The result is far from the first state, but I am satisfied. The danger in artwork is always self-illusion, what I use to call « blindness », or self-satisfaction. It is indeed very difficult to judge one’s own productions, the mind is often a skilled sycophant. Time may help to struggle against this tendency. I just saw a painting from 2003 and found it very lousy. I am trying now to rescue it with collage, but the result is still not satisfying. So I shall say that the worse the artist, the more pretentious he/she is. And still, some poems from Victor Hugo are not at the height of his best inspiration. All this to remember to be aware of my own limits and of the necessicity of critical examination of my works.


Here the link to the collage

Well, this is of course playing with words:
First of all, a collage featuring M.J. which I wanted to be as ambiguous as the artist himself. And, looking closer, there is something medical about it, in the way he is manipulating us or himself, with the loss of brain in both cases.

The prince I am speaking of here, is Richard Prince, the glorious painter of nurses. So, here I am too, I am not a prince, but a simple commoner, and my works, as you know perhaps, don't cost one percent of the Prince's.

My nurse is joyfully liberated, she throws all her clothes away, but keeps cautiously her mask, is that an allusion on safe sex or on a threatening epidemic? Collages are mysterious, their meaning difficult to seize, my discourse on my art so flat - I feel happy and stupid at the same time by these summer days.

This collage:
came very quickly, in an instant. A family member had asked me for something on boats and sea, a magazine was open on the seascape from Marquet, and the pipe-line worker beneath. And it matched imediately. I fitted the captain's head to the pipe - and it was done! C. was delighted, me too, because I liked this joke with the very bourgeois seascape from Marquet, adapting it to our times. And... last not least, I am a sort of pirate too, with my hijacking of pictures. But it's only imaginary, and light. Sometimes it's good to make light collages: it's summer, it's very hot in my study and life is easy as the song says.
The link to the bigger version:

This collage started with a picture of a camel race. It came quite quickly and I focused on the face. Afterwards I was thinking about the human condition and the sufferings people endure, especially in Africa: those terrible pictures of refugees in Sudan for ex. As everybody, I am aware that I am unable to change anything by my art, but it had just to come out of me.
There are still some aspects of this collage that I don't understand: the presence of the thumb and how the face fits so well into the animal's body. In fact, there's another collage which shows the same merging between man and animal:

The content here is much lighter - it is more a joke about men today: they got a ring through their nose, but behave proudly.
Enjoy!

I rewrite this commentary which has been erased.

In fact, it started with the hand full of pills. I cut it out and began looking for a matching photo. The idea was “addiction”, the promise of happiness and death. But I got stuck; I didn't find anything I liked. Only something very illustrative. And I don't want a univocal collage, a clear message like in propaganda. It’s not what I am looking for. So at last, I found the picture of the woman and then the one with the torn face. It was like in a dream when I put it against the hand: I felt that I had it done. Why? Because I followed form, not content, I gave over to my hidden artist (or my intuition) who knows better than me. How? My wife is surely right when she thinks that as a little Jewish boy in Germany, language was dangerous, so I developed a way of thinking in pictures, before elaborating words. They come afterwards, when I am looking at my collage: I understand that the nurturing of the hungry girl is an ambiguous gesture made of love and murder. André says that those pictures come from far away, even before childhood, in hidden memories I am unconscious of. The hidden artist gives me the chance to carry out this heritage which reveals itself without giving the key to a rational understanding. The enigma remains, but I can glean some apercus. This explains why I am so dissatisfied with univocal pictures. Which pill is the right one? Or should one refrain from taking any of them? Is it like Pandora’s box or the ticket to heaven?

THE MAKING OF : HEAD
This making of seems quite interesting to myself. Because it shows the deconstruction-reconstruction process of a collage. The more I am making collages , the stronger I believe that my collages deal with reconstruction. It was very tempting to deconstruct the French neo-fascist leader Le Pen, but I wasn’t so much satisfied with the result and decided to reconstruct the whole in direction of a Jewish face, which emerged without intention. The best “punishment” for this notorious racist leader is to make him disappear behind this face. Finally, reconstruction means the disappearance of the initial elements, but not of the scheme. So, yes the modification is radical, but the central idea undergoes a modification, from destruction to a constructive new meaning. And this has been done without my conscious acting: I love my hidden artist who guides my choices. The time spent on the collage: choice of the picture and first transformation into a caricature: yesterday night. The other states came very quickly in about 30 minutes of intense work.
Cette séquence me semble très intéressante à cause du processus de déconstruction-reconstruction du collage. Plus je fais du collage, plus je pense que la reconstruction y est un élément clé. Il était très tentant de déconstruire Le Pen, mais le résultat ne m’a pas satisfait de sorte que je me mis à reconstruire la face, ce qui aboutit à une tête juive – du moins c’est ce que je compris après coup – qui émergea sans ma volonté. La meilleure « punition » pour ce leader aux propos racistes répétés n’est-elle pas de le faire disparaître derrière un autre visage ? Ainsi ma transformation est radicale, mais l’idée centrale persiste tout en subissant une modification, avec un sens nouveau, positif. Et cela se passa sans ma volonté active : j’aime mon artiste caché qui guide mes choix. Le temps passé à faire ce collage : le choix de la photo, la première transformation en caricature : hier soir. Et puis, le lendemain soir, en une demi-heure de travail intense les autres étapes jusqu’à l’arrêt de l’image et l’évidence de ce qui s’était passé.








The link to the bigger picture

THE MAKING OF: COUPLE
After several trips here I am again. The making of this collage is an illustration of how my “hidden artist” is working: my wife’s anniversary is approaching and I can’t refrain from linking this collage to it. As usual, the faces are torn: the men’s is pushed toward a Jewish look and a gesture one can find in some ancient paintings of Noblemen with their spouse. I am tempted to recognize myself in the left eye of the figure: it seems witty to me, my wife speaking of me as “quicksilverish”. As to the woman, maybe I idealize her inner safety and assurance – it is contradicted by her face. Anyway, the picture looks quite happy – a sort of fusion without mutual absorption and that seems highly desirable for a couple.

For André, the French version:
Après plusieurs voyages, me voici de retour. La fabrication de ce collage illustre comme mon « artiste caché » procède. En effet, à l’approche de l’anniversaire de D., je ne peux m’empêcher de faire le lien avec ce collage. Comme d’habitude, les visages sont déformés : celui de l’homme est tiré vers un faciès juif, son geste est celui d’un seigneur avec son épouse dans certaines peintures de cour. Je suis tenté de me reconnaître dans l’œil gauche de l’homme : il me semble malicieux, D. parlant de me moi comme étant comme du vif argent. Quant à la femme, j’ai l’impression d’idéaliser sa force tranquille – mais il y a contradiction avec son visage. Mais, somme toute, l’image exprime du bonheur, une fusion sans absorption mutuelle, ce qui me semble désirable dans un couple.

I: We should talk about our relationship.
C: Again? I think it’s useless, we had so many arguments about that in the past…
I: That’s true, but...
C: OK then, speak.
I: First, I would like to know if you’re comfortable.
C: Well, lying in a black box between my companions is not what I prefer, especially in summer. And some of them are still sticky.
I: Oh, I am sorry; I’ll have a look on this. But my question was about the picture.
C: Well, I lack space, the ceiling is so low, and actually I am trying to get out of the picture. See my left foot? I am almost in your world.
I: Please stay where you are or you’ll leave half of you in the room. Why don’t you just play guitar and dance in your house?
C: It's so old fashioned, no computer, no TV set, nothing from this century. I need a handy!
I: Hm, maybe I can do something about that, but I think it wouldn't fit in the picture.
C: The problem is, I don’t feel quite at ease in here and I got this holy face, from you! So what can I do with that? Shall I be boringly decent forever?
I: Oh come on, let’s have some fun and be happy. Modern women don’t stay home sewing and cooking. Otherwise they'll depress.
C: So let me out!
I: I cannot. I just can suggest the move, not realise it like in a movie or a video. I am very sorry about that.
C: You should learn how to do it. Free me!
I: Maybe with a computer, but I prefer static pictures. Oh, I have to leave you now.
C: Like always when we speak about important things.

The link to the bigger picture