Week 1: What Was I Thinking???
“her absorption in new challenges, illuminating.”
Collage, cut and torn New Yorker Magazine paper, 9" x 12"
What WAS I thinking???
Okay, I only said that right out loud ONCE this week. When I stood up from the floor after hunching over my work for five hours. But I did it! COLLAGE #1 COMPLETE!
But for real. What was I thinking?
I don’t have any magazine subscriptions anymore. If I’m buying a magazine that usually means I’m at the airport facing a long flight. A Vanity Fair or New Yorker makes for a pleasant passage.
I’ve had subscriptions in the past, and I’ve saved some of those magazines for potential collage work. A large portion of my collection came from a curbside jackpot—a giant suitcase filled with National Geographics. (Did you know that a giant suitcase of National Geographics weighs as much as a giant suitcase of anvils? Literally.) My New Yorkers are coming from friends with subscriptions who are passing them along to me.
I love the notion of repurposing magazines into art. I don’t have to buy new paper; I’m recycling what’s already out there. One intention behind this challenge to self is to add focus and energy to the notion of a more sustainable world. Why buy more and more stuff when I can re-create with what I have?
This week’s featured cartoon.
Why specifically New Yorkers? I’ve always loved its aesthetic—the covers, design, fonts. There’s fiction and non-fiction. Poetry, reviews. And THE CARTOONS. Who doesn’t love the New Yorker cartoons??? (Don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.)
And it comes out weekly. One issue, one collage, one week. It seemed to be a perfect match.
As I was kicking around this idea, I glanced through a stack of New Yorkers and was drawn to one particular cover. On closer look, I realized the artwork was a paper cutout. That pretty much clinched it. The Universe was giving me confirmation that I was on the right track. (That’s how me and Uni roll. I ask for signs, it gives them. It’s up to me to see and interpret. I’ve asked for billboards in the sky—IN ENGLISH PLEASE—but the Universe prefers subtleties, apparently. Fine.)
So this paper cutout issue is the one I started with. I’ve decided not to incorporate the covers in the collage. I’m saving them for I-don’t-know-what-yet.
“Toni Morrison” by Kara Walker
This cover art is by Kara Walker. Check her out. I remember when she did a huge installation in the old Domino Sugar factory in Brooklyn in 2014, although I didn’t remember her name. This cover is called “Toni Morrison.” Toni had just died two weeks prior to publication.
One potential obstacle I’m facing is that New Yorkers don’t have a huge amount of color in them. Probably because they don’t bombard you with ads. I’m good with that. I expect I’ll be working with a lot of black and white and limited color palettes. That’s okay. It forces me to take what I’m given and make it work. (Thank you, Tim Gunn. Thank you, LIFE ON EARTH.)
To begin the process this week, I spent a delicious Sunday reading through the issue while my phone was in another room. That’s part of my plan—less time scrolling. Can I get a witness?
The first time I instinctively reached for the phone to look up a word, I decided to make notes to self: look up “capacious;” look up Marilyn Maye. (She’s Ella Fitzgerald’s “favorite white singer,” apparently.) I also jotted down words and phrases that popped out at me so I could go back and cut them out.
The starting point for the whole collage was the architectural piece cut from the first words of each line of a poem. I didn’t know how I would end up incorporating it, but I thought it would be interesting. Once I decided to use it as sort of a city skyline, the rest of the piece fell into place.
Detail — “her absorption in new challenges, illuminating.”
The size? 8x11 inches, roughly the same as the magazine.
The title? Well I would have been a fool to ignore THAT sign from the Universe. (See detail above.)
And there you have it. Week 1. DONE!
