PIECEWORK

Tomorrow is the last day of my show at the tiny Loggia Gallery of the Berkeley City Club.  I will take down my collages, pile them into the trunk of my car, and cart them home to hang on the walls of my staircase while I ponder whether to offer them somewhere else. 

I discovered collage through the work of Nick Bantock, author of Griffin & Sabine (often described as “The Jolly Postman for adults") and a large number of other beautiful books.  Griffin & Sabine brought me skidding to a stop when I saw it in a carousel at an unfamiliar library one day. They were ready to close, but I literally refused to leave until I’d acquired a library card so I could take the book home with me.

Years later, I started collaging myself, almost unknowingly.  Certain pretty pieces of paper and other materials just seemed to demand to be glued down together on a piece of paper.  After I’d done this a few times, I started messing some paint into the mix, and a little glitter (with me, there’s always a little glitter sooner or later) and some other stuff.  And a few years ago, I was lucky enough to study a bit with Nick Bantock at his studio on Salt Spring Island.  Might have been the four happiest days of my life.

Collage has always seemed an essentially feminine art form to me. Assembled from scraps of paper and other materials, a collage creates something new from pieces of old throwaway stuff, in much the same way women have made quilts for hundreds of years, or their children’s clothes, or decorated objects with found bits of shell, mirror, beach glass.

Piecework—sewing work done in the home and paid by the piece—was traditionally women’s work. This is also how most women tend to do their personal work: in the pieces of time we tuck in around the corners of our regular work. We live in a time where women piece new lives together out of the shards and remnants of old lives and old roles as a matter of course. My collages are, in part, an exploration of that process.  They are also meant to be pure pleasure—bits of fun.

I’ve shown my work a few times, here and there, but never been very serious about it.  After all, it’s just fun, right?  Or is it a little more than that?

Maybe I’ll call the ArtBeat Salon on Solano…they have a nice gallery space.  Who knows? They might like some collages on those lovely brick walls.