Photomontage and mosaic

My final year at college (1989) I finally settled into making photomontage , and in those days without the use of a computer programme. I would cut up pictures from magazines, take photos of scenes and people and arrange the pieces, then take a final photo which I would then process in black and white. Sometimes I would paint part of the photo with special photo paints. I was into dada and surrealism – ( can’t you tell?!)  Most often the idea was spontaneous – I had no final image in my head before I started. But the process of the choice and  juxtoposition of the images were the most important  part. Those pieces arranged to make a whole.

I also made videos at college, and studied contemporary dance. Some of the videos were stop motion animations and others were real life action videos, only cut up and re-arranged again like a collage, a photomontage. In dance classes I had to choreograph my dances . I had to design and  choose the moves I made and put them into some kind of order…. for both video and dance , the process of choice and juxtoposition are most important, as well as timing.

In 1994 I was asked by a headteacher of a school if I could make a mosaic on the school wall with the kids. So from photomontage, collage and video art, it seemed a logical progression. Again practising the process of choice and juxtoposition.   Pieces that make a whole.

(If you look at the menu on your right and click my photomontage you can see some more of my work from 1989)