Mixed Media Collage Tips & Research

This week you should be aiming to create 4 (or more) mixed media collages. Use your existing Architecture imagery as the basis for this - prints, photos and drawings. Try manipulating them on the photocopier or through photoshop too. Combine this imagery with the additional collage ingredients supplied - coloured papers, stickers, tape, squared/graph paper, envelopes and tags. 
A few pointers:

• Inclusion of text, numbers and symbols can be very effective.
• Using strong focal points (e.g. a larger image of a particular building) often helps your collages becoming too fragmented.
• As well as papers you might work back into your collages with paint, spray stencils, pens etc.
• Along with addition be aware that subtraction can be a key part of the collage process. If your images become overcrowded using areas of plain papers or white paint can be an effective way of freshening up your piece. Careful consideration about the retention of areas of space as you make the collage is another way to do this.
• As with other images we have created this year producing a composition with balance that leads the viewer's eye as you intend is the ideal. Repetition of colours or symbols can help achieve this, along with strong directional elements.

To support and inform your own collage experiments you should look at the work of all the following Artists/Designers who use collage techniques in creating their work. Once you have familiarised yourself with their work choose one of the Artists whose work is illustrated below and produce 2 pages of research into their practice. As usual obtain several good reproductions of their work, provide some background information and analyse at least 2 images in depth, identifying what media are being used and commenting on how they are being handled is particularly important. 

Richard Galpin

Martin O'Neill

Robert Rauschenberg

Nazario Graziano

Tim Marrs