For my two final collages, I decided to focus on the past and the memories that come from them. I tried to make the colors more muted and incorporate photos that would represent the past and put them in the present.
For this project, I realized after spending time cutting up and rearranging images that all of my images had something to do with pavement and sky, or at least pavement and nature. I had planned to use a different collage for my last piece, but upon working on it I realized that it didn’t fit the same theme as my other collages.
South Congress has become an important area for me to travel. The stores have all been vital to my improved stay here, and these photo and gathering projects have forced me to explore SoCo whereas I probably wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for the project.
Final Collages
Practice Collages
VISU1311 Project #2 Collage 1 Yenesis Moreno
Final two-
VISU1311 Project #2 Collage 2 Yenesis Moreno
Practice Collages
VISU1311 Project #2 Collage 3 Yenesis Moreno
VISU1311 Project #2 Collage 4 Yenesis Moreno
VISU1311 Project #2 Collage 5 Yenesis Moreno
VISU1311 Project #2 Collage 6 Yenesis Moreno
Collages explanation
My experience with experimenting and working on the Harmony project was very time consuming and expressive. I really enjoyed working with physical objects and with my hands to actually create the collage. My first approach was to plan out step by step everything I would do but as I continued onto the final two collages I grew and just let the shapes and photographs guide the way on its own based on composition. This method put me in a more uncomfortable spot because I usually like to know how something will turn out but in this case I just had to let it be. Even though I personally was not completely pleased by every aspect the final two collages I really like the overall composition and the idea of making something out of nothing. My overall theme, light, carried on from the first project and it was a really fun to portray with my distorted photographs. I noticed that I really enjoyed working with lines and the parallels alongside the sky and the warm colors of the sunset and the lightbulbs. Working on south congress was interesting but overwhelming, there is just so much going on that it was difficult to start but once you get started it becomes easy to continue and find other objects that fits the set. I learned from our first project that most things should complement each piece so I focused on really keeping the theme and lines throughout all 6 collages I made. I used Photoshop mostly as a drafting tool and only portrayed parts of my ideas digitally. I mostly worked with whole printed images and distorted them myself by hand and then executed my ideas and developed from them physically.
Other Requirements-
I recognized a common theme of objects I was taking photographs of in our last project and when creating our practice collages. However, after I decided to look deeper into what I was creating and capturing, it lead me to the conclusion that a majority of my works demonstrated the coexistence of living and non-living things. I decided to take this idea and incorporate it into my collages by using my photographs and scans of living and non-living things. I created collages that reconstructed my scans and images in such a way that they work together to either create a living or non-living scene. They create a harmonious collage by combining texture and shape in order to create a “bigger picture”.
Final Collages
In my first final collage I used my scans of trash and my photographs of plants to create the living scene of a flower on a hill. I used a newspaper I found on South Congress as the background, which I scanned in motion in order to give it a “living” effect.
In my second final collage I decided to reconstruct my image of the leaves with the cup and the of the newspaper on the ground in order to create the shape of mountains by cutting and pasting triangle shapes. Then I tore the newspaper I found into cloud shapes wherever I could find an address that included South Congress street. Both of these processes created the non-living mountain scene shown in this collage.
Practice Collages
Harmony in Collage
For there two collages, I focused more on using the found things and trash I picked up on South Congress. When making these image, I was thinking of human consumption and how what we take into ourselves often define who we are. I used the glove, thread, and found advertisement to show carnal consumption and give the image a kind of creepy gory movie feeling. I felt that these different materials really worked together despite their varying textures and connotations.
Another concept I was thinking about was how the things people consume can change the mood of a person, or even give them character. The cup the man was holding matched the cups I found on South Congress, and the image of the cup really communicated consumption to me because the cup is a vessel for consuming things and can serve as a representation of intake. I was also thinking about how when people consume things, they gain power, energy, and ability to do extraordinary things. Using the cups as a substrate seemed to tie the image together through color and content.
SCANS
3 starting collages:
The rest of my scans:
SCREENSHOTS OF PROCESS
Scanning
Color Settings
Exporting as TIFFs
Harmony Collages:
I took South Congress settings, deconstruct them, and reconstruct them to have a semi-surreal feeling through the use of a lack of depth, juxtaposition, and visually interesting color combinations- making the images feel almost alien, because I am not from Austin and South Congress was a very alien setting for me while I shot.
In this collage, I wanted to focus in the messiness of South Congress. During the times I went out to shoot on South Congress, there was always some kind of construction going on. I felt like I captured the chaotic and sloppy nature that I frequently saw on South Congress. I also wanted to use colors as a compositional element. I used a color scheme of blue, pink, yellow, and brown to guide the eye throughout the piece.
This collage was one that I completed in class and later retouched. In this collage, I wanted to focus on the idea of negative space and framing devices. I used the negative space as a unifying element, and I took the blue sky and turned it into an organic use of positive space. I also wanted to experiment with layers, creating different planes on top of one another. This collage was inspired the interplay between geometric and organic forms that I saw on South Congress.
This collage was one of my first collages that I created in class. I wanted to play with the idea of negative space and show how the skyscrapers and manmade buildings reminded me of crystalline structures rising into the sky. I have always been drawn to skylines, and I was interested in how the negative space could become positive if it showed an inverted reflection of the buildings in the sky.
In this collage, I was inspired by the muted colors of the similar tan buildings. I wanted to further the idea of an inverted reflection, and I liked the narrative of an upside down world. I wanted to mostly play with color relationships in this collage and contract between the gritty found note and the clear setting. I also was interested by the confusion of depth by having all of the variations of flat color.
This was one of my earlier in class collages. I wanted to show the idea of a fractured setting and play with different masks and layers. The different masks got me started playing around with the idea of flat color. I also enjoyed deconstructing the setting and overlapping the pieces so that it gave the impression of a fractured photograph. I played with the color of the sky to contrast the early afternoon lighting with the perception of a setting sun.
The process of taking apart images I had recorded to truly make an image was very difficult for me at first. I had grown attached to my images and it took a few tries before I really understood what I needed to do in order to make images that are my own. I did my best to pull colors and textures from my original photographs, not “things.” I think I accomplished this in my first collage, by taking the attributes of my subjects and using them without showing what they actually are. However, in my second collage, I took a different approach and chose to make something a little more in my element. I combined a few different scanned items and applied some more graphic design oriented techniques to create something that looks more like an object. I really enjoyed playing with methods and exploring what I could do to the different elements of a photo to create an image.
Harmony
Relationships among colors, shapes, elements, form, space, texture, value, proportion, time…
Changing meaning, creating rhythm, manipulating perception
Throughout the creation of my collages, I inherently pushed for repetition of color and shapes within the “frame”. I really enjoy the creation of different worlds, illusions, and ideas through imagery.
In the collage I placed first (titled Recognition) I began to repeat different elements in diverging directions in order to convert the flat space into a space of layered color and forms. I incorporated the scanned tin foil face and the South Congress bowling pins (which both have recognizable facial elements) in order to continue this idea of face throughout the piece. I noticed that by varying the contrasts and brightness of the background imagery, I could create an illusion of depth and movement.
In my second collage (titled Ascendance) I wanted to create a bright environment that delivers a sense of rotation and the main subject (the skeleton with the gigantic head and cigar) rising. I worked a lot on layering multiple elements and creating repetition through the cloning tool. I think the balance of this image may require a little more work (maybe through lowering the repeated pickle-like shapes more weight would gravitate towards the center).
Final Images: Compositions of Interacting Thoughts
Process
Formal Exercises, Experimental Collages
Although this collage was the final collage I made, I call it an “experimental collage” because during the process I was focusing not solely on the whole image, but more on the idea of creating the different elements in the image. Within this collage I experimented with the cloning and selection tool in order to supply different makeup to the shapes. I also developed the background by cloning a sticker.
I didn’t put as much time into this piece as the other digital images, too, but I think this image may work with the addition of text and maybe a few more adjustments.
Within the physical collage above (which was the first collage I created), I worked around cut-outs of an already-established backdrop of the outside of a restaurant. I wanted to manipulate the viewer’s perception of the space as well as of the people at the tables, so I switched out their heads with the skeletons’ heads. I worked to create a balance of direction, so I added the arm and different angular lines to add to the concept as well as composition. I titled this piece “Peace be with you” in order to evoke ideas of violence, peace, religion, weaponry, and the implementation of each within cultures and societies.
Within the collage above, I wanted to utilize circular shapes in order to create depth, rhythm, and an overall unity. I worked to align the image of the shoes in the window with the picture of the silver cans underneath. I wanted to unite these two images because of their metallic, textural nature. I repeated the circles and reds through additional elements on the sides (these circles also mirror the pattern on the tights).
I also experimented through two other physical collages (which I have not scanned). Through those collages, I utilized a lot of paper bag material and I wanted to experiment with three-dimensional layering and form (making collages an object rather than an image).
Scanning Objects
The objects I scanned consisted mostly of trash and leaves. When I was choosing the objects I wanted to scan and incorporate into my collages, I wanted items that I could manipulate (such as the tin foil) and objects that had naturally and graphically interesting lines and shapes (such as the leaves and seed-like object in the scan titled “Three’s A Crowd”). I also chose objects because of their color (such as the bright yellow Starburst wrapper and the old, broken, plastic, pink pen cap).
In some scans I moved the leaves, stick, and sculpted tin foil as the scanner processed the information, which created reverberating lines of distorted color.
Scanned images can be found on my personal blog under the same section, via.
Color Profile (ProPhoto RGB) and Naming Properties:
File Extensions and Naming (ISO dating and Tifs):
