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Found Materials

Toshiko Okanoue

Last Modified February 25, 2019 Leave a Comment

Born in 1928, in Kochi, Japan, Toshiko Okanoue grew up in Tokyo. She began to make photo collages while she was studying fashion design and drawing in Bunka Gakuin in the early 1950s. When she first began working, she had very little art historical knowledge, and knew nothing of the Surrealist movement.

In post-war Japan, a shortage of goods and materials meant the country was flooded with commodities from foreign countries. Okanoue used fragments from Western fashion magazines such as Life, Harper’s Bazaar and Vogue, to create radical compositions combining body parts, animals and inanimate objects in dynamic arrangements. Although the component parts of her collages originated from Western sources, Okanoue herself regarded her technique of image making as deeply rooted in Japanese tradition. She thought of her works as a form of hari-e (‘hari’ meaning pasting and ‘e’ meaning a picture in Japanese), a traditional Japanese technique of making pictures by pasting small pieces of coloured paper onto pasteboard.

It was only in 1952, upon meeting the poet and artist Shuzo Takiguchi, that Okanoue found her own place in art history. Takiguchi was a leading figure of the Surrealist movement in Japan, and introduced Okanoue to the works of the famous Surrealist, Max Ernst, whose style had a decisive influence on her. During the subsequent six years, Okanoue produced over 100 works. Her collages remained idiosyncratic and dreamlike in their juxtaposition of contradictory imagery. In 1953 and 1956, she held solo exhibitions at Takemiya Gallery, Tokyo. However, as with many Japanese women of this era, her marriage in 1957 ended her artistic career.

Okanoue returned to her hometown of Kochi, where she now lives. She is married to the painter Fujino Kazutomo. Her work faded into obscurity and was overlooked for almost 40 years. However, it was rediscovered by the curator of the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography in the mid 1990s, and has since gained recognition for its contribution to the Japanese avant-garde. In 1996 her works was shown in Meguro Museum of Art, and has subsequently been collected by the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

– via huxleyparlour.com/toshiko-okanoue-a-surrealist-in-japan/

Meeting - Toshiko Okanoue
Toshiko Okanoue - Autumn - 1954
Toshiko Okanoue - Full of Life - 1954
Toshiko Okanoue 1
Toshiko Okanoue
Toshiko Okanoue 3
Toshiko Okanoue 4
Toshiko Okanoue 5
Toshiko Okanoue 6
Toshiko Okanoue 7
Toshiko Okanoue 8
Toshiko Okanoue 9
Toshiko Okanoue 10
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Toshiko Okanoue 12
Toshiko Okanoue 13
Toshiko Okanoue- in love - 1953
Toshiko Okanoue- The Miracle of Silence 2
Toshiko Okanoue- The Miracle of Silence 3
Toshiko Okanoue- The Miracle of Silence 4
Toshiko Okanoue- The Miracle of Silence 5
Toshiko Okanoue- The Miracle of Silence
Toshiko Okanoue
toshiko-okanoue-noblewoman-1954-from-the-miracle-of-silence-nazraeli-press-2007

Filed Under: Collage Tagged With: Alegorical, Black and White, Conceptual, Figurative, Found Materials, Illustration, Juxtaposition, Psychological, Victorian

Genres: Surrealism

Charles Wilkin Collage

Last Modified April 30, 2018 Leave a Comment

Terms And Conditions Collage - by Charles Wilkin

About Charles Wilkin

My work is a loose collection of thoughts and observations in many ways and less about one specific theme. I see it as being a reflection of the world we live in, with all its ugliness and cruelty. But from that, I strive to extract the beauty and empathy hidden underneath and within us all, revealing the unknown, the unspoken and intangible things that make us truly human. For me, collage as a medium replicates this frenetic and inherent collision of people, culture, and emotions we all experience. I believe the true meaning of my work is derived directly from the intertwining of these associations, and the spontaneity of my creative process. This gives my work the freedom to live creatively in the moment, and the ability to respond to current events, despite my imagery being derived primarily from vintage magazines.

Inversion Collage by Charles Wilkin

In Ruins Collage by Charles Wilkin

Decoy Collage by Charles Wilkin

Smog Sculpture by Charles Wilkin

charlesscottwilkin.com

Filed Under: Collage Tagged With: Conceptual, Found Materials, Transformation

Genres: Low Brow, Surrealism, Symbolism

Beth Hoeckel

Last Modified February 10, 2018 Leave a Comment

Mirage - By Beth Hoeckel
Cover Up - By Beth Hoeckel
Blow a Wish - By Beth Hoeckel
Dredge - By Beth Hoeckel
Seethe - by Beth Hoeckel
Psyche - by Beth Hoeckel
Clear History - by Beth Hoeckel
Immortelle - by Beth Hoeckel
Birthday Present - by Beth Hoeckel
Night Rainbow - by Beth Hoeckel
Creation - by Beth Hoeckel
Ranges - by Beth Hoeckel
Peachy - by Beth Hoeckel
Plume - by Beth Hoeckel
Get Over It - by Beth Hoeckel
Photo Synthesis - by Beth Hoeckel
Holy Mountain - by Beth Hoeckel
Distance - by Beth Hoeckel
Solar Eclipse - by Beth Hoeckel
Count Sheep - by Beth Hoeckel
Home - by Beth Hoeckel
Star Chart - by Beth Hoeckel
Volcano at Night - by Beth Hoeckel
Ancients - by Beth Hoeckel
Golden Moon - by Beth Hoeckel
April Showers - by Beth Hoeckel
Sunbathing - by Beth Hoeckel
Entrance - by Beth Hoeckel
Clairvoyance - by Beth Hoeckel
Currents - by Beth Hoeckel
Water Signs - by Beth Hoeckel
Campground - by Beth Hoeckel
Sleepless - by Beth Hoeckel
Moon River - by Beth Hoeckel
Ember - by Beth Hoeckel
Glacial - by Beth Hoeckel
Moonrise - by Beth Hoeckel

About Beth Hoeckel

Beth Hoeckel is a multidisciplinary artist and illustrator from Baltimore.

She earned a BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago where she studied painting, photography, and printmaking— but her main area of expertise is in the medium of collage. Beth began her first widely-known series of collages in 2010, and has been a full-time freelance artist since 2012. Over the past 5 years her work has been exhibited around the world and published in many prestigious books and magazines.

Beth can currently be found creating collage and mixed media art for arts’ sake, as well as illustrating for a variety of clients including Rookie, Domino, The New York Times, and many more.

Beth Hoeckel Collage

Filed Under: Collage Tagged With: Found Materials, Juxtaposition, Limited Color Palette, Politics, Pop Culture

Genres: Surrealism

Frank Moth

Last Modified March 30, 2019 Leave a Comment

About Frank Moth

Frank Moth creates nostalgic postcards from a distant but at the same time familiar future. He makes digital collages and compositions with specific, distinctive color palettes, in a critically acclaimed style that is immediately recognizable. Frank Moth was born in Athens in March 2014. He exists as an artist and as an alias for the two people that hide behind him. He has been featured in many publications worldwide, such as Huffington Post US, as well as Buzzfeed and MTV Greece. His work is currently showcased around the world in many galleries online

You Will Find Me There - by Frank Moth
Welcome Back - By Frank Moth
We Chose This Road My Dear - by Frank Moth
We are all fisherman - By Frank Moth
Those Evenings - By Frank Moth
They Are Waiting For us - By Frank Moth
The Unexpected - By Frank Moth
The Manual - By Frank Moth
Thassos - By Frank Moth
Stand By Me - By Frank Moth
Since I Left You - By Frank Moth
Sad - By Frank Moth
My Worlds Fall Apart - by Frank Moth
Love Is Alway Waiting - By Frank Moth
Heroes - By Frank Moth
Her - by Frank Moth
Happines Here - by Frank Moth
Forest Angel - by Frank Moth
Follow Me - by Frank Moth
Bright Cinnamon - by Frank Moth
Be - By Frank Moth
Across the History - by Frank Moth
24916 - By Frank Moth

Artist Statement

The compositions are mainly human-centered. The presence of the human element is obvious, yet perpetually incomplete. There’s always something missing, interrupted, or covered. The face, for example, is usually covered and many times it’s not even there, so as to not surrender its vulnerable introspection, insecurity, and psychic truth without a fight.

Depersonalization/Derealization

In many of Frank Moth’s works people are pictured gazing upon themselves and their own lives on Earth from some distant point in outer space. The perspective of all things always seems to be on a strange verge, between a dream and an urban daily life.

The smothering failure of man to define and refine happiness today within geographic, temporal, and material {technological and consumerist} bounds, is repeatedly alluded to through the use of old, manipulated paper ads from decades past, as well as old fashion magazines.

Revision/Revival/Rebirth/Insecurity

Many of the artworks feature a subtle expression of companionship or the silent, solitary, obsessive search for it {the people usually have their backs turned and there is a hint of movement in the scenery}, combined with the surreal size disproportion and the disturbed relation between man and his environment/surroundings.

Obsession/Music/Pixels/Architecture

This is an attempt to create harmony between people and their surroundings, however imaginary, by using the eternal elements of colours, numbers, simple geometric shapes, symmetry, and subtraction, as well as universal words and concepts like “love”, “together”, “forever”, “never”, “infinity”, “why”.

Frank Moth

Filed Under: Collage Tagged With: Alegorical, Anxiety, Cinema, Conceptual, Figurative, Found Materials, Juxtaposition, Pop Culture, Psychological, Sci-fi, Space

Genres: Lowbrow Art (Pop Surrealism), Surrealism

øjeRum Collage Art

Last Modified January 4, 2019 2 Comments

Needles by oejerum.dk
ny-nål by oejerum.dk
nef by oejerum.dk
organman by oejerum.dk
Naaal by oejerum.dk
Naale square by oejerum.dk
birdwoman by oejerum.dk
NSS27_cut by oejerum.dk
Naaleee by oejerum.dk

Copenhagen based collage artist.

oejerum.dk

Filed Under: Collage Tagged With: Black and White, Found Materials, Limited Color Palette, Portrait, Psychological, Victorian

Genres: Conceptual Art

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