My first collage painting is finished! I'm proud of myself for pushing through on this one. I am not sure if painting is for me. I love the finished product, and I love the flexibility, yet it feels like a chore to carve out time for. Or, is that how it's supposed to feel?
I painted this with acrylic on aquabord. I tend to get really roped into my set-up when I'm working on a series, so I have another empty 16x20" aquabord waiting to be painted in my studio. My goal would be to make maybe 4 of these and reassess materials/size/etc. from there. The collages I've made thus far have been in a 'free-creating' approach, sort of like free-writes where I attempt not to filter or curate specifically and instead reach for the imagery that pops out at me as I browse. After completing the collage I reflect on it and pull out symbolism and patterns, and it helps in self-discovery and working through my feelings on certain subjects and events.
So free-creating is where my work with collages started. These past couple of weeks I've started working on a new collage series to explore gender, gender fluidity, our typical cultural expectations on gender, which becomes a mesh of free-creating and looking for particular images. I find it silly that men 'can't wear skirts' and women 'have to shave', etc. etc. I'd like to see more depictions of crossing our traditional gender lines. It just shouldn't be taboo, and it kind of blows my mind that we still have a ways to go with our judgments. More on that soon.