"Gone to the dogs" pet portrait collage

Above is a recent collage, more whimsical than most!Based on positive response from a recent pet portrait commission for a veterinary hospital, I've started a new series called "Poundlings," harkening back to my ongoing Foundlings series (mostly found faces).All the collages in this series will ultimately need adoption and I feel the eventual owner(s) should name these creatures so, for now, despite the fact that several "perfect" names have occurred to me, this canine is fondly referred to as Poundling 2.I'm happy to announce that Poundling 2 is included in a juried exhibit, "Gone to the Dogs 2," at Niza Knoll Gallery, opening Friday, October 15th from 5-8pm. The gallery is located at 915 Santa Fe Drive, Denver, Colorado. The show will be up through November 13th and a portion of the proceeds benefit the MaxFund.The background is made of "pet for sale" want ads, tinted with acrylic paint, while the dog is composed of elements from contemporary magazines. The collage is 14 x 11" on hardboard panel, plus framing (not shown).

"Potential" in National Collage Society's annual exhibit

Happy to hear that my collage, "Potential," has been juried into the National Collage Society's 26th Annual Juried Exhibit!

For the first time, the exhibit "Green & Global" will be online with no need to ship work to a gallery or museum. The notification included the statistic that 211 artists submitted a total of 412 entries... 32 entered with slides and 380 submitted digital image. (Slides are obviously becoming a thing of the past when it comes to art presentation!)

I'm curious about how many entries were juried in... since wall space was not an issue! The exhibit will be available online for a year beginning November 1st. I'll be sure to post a link when the exhibition website goes live.

(Addendum: This exhibition is now available for online viewing here.)

Galvanized for Day of the Dead

I've been wanting to try out some different supports for collage and had some small pieces of galvanized metal in the studio... So I used a 6 x 4" piece to create a collage ofrenda to donate to A Book About Death's Day of the Dead exhibition at the Fort Worth Community Arts Center in Fort Worth, Texas, sponsored by the FluxMuseum.

"Retablo 2010" (above) has acrylic paint applied to the metal, with collage added, and was coated with a UV varnish. The collage elements seemed to adhere well to the galvanized metal and I like the very understated, industrial, sparkle. I will definitely experiment further with using metal in my work. The composition is intended to be somber, thought-provoking, and uplifting all at the same time... hope I've accomplished that in some small way!

Finis: subject to interpretation

Several people have asked to see the final piece that emerged from the work I wrote about in an earlier "Chaos of collage composition" blog post.Here's a better view of the collage I eventually titled, "Subject to Interpretation." Once I cleared away the chaos, it had seemed complete.I submitted it to Spark Gallery's open show this summer, "Biennial 2010: Big Themes/Small Works," juried by Jill Crow, and was pleased to be included in the show during July.The collage is 10 x 10 x 1" and is composed of contemporary recycled papers applied to a cradled wood panel. Some collage elements continue and wrap around the 1" edges so it still appears a bit differently when hung.