Cut, Copy, Paste: The Art of Contemporary Collage
May 3 - Aug. 3, 2003
Bruce Conner, Go Ask Tucker, 1962, collage
and found objects, 48 ½ x 40 in., de Saisset Museum permanent
collection, Museum purchase with fund donated by Robert Prentice,
Paula Kirkeby, Ruth A. Benson, The Collector's Forum and Partners
in Excellence, 18.9.1987
John O'Reilly, Tears,8-9-99 (#5), 1999
polaroid montage, 71/8 x 7 1/8 in., Courtesy of the artist and
Catherine Clark Gallery.
George Herms, String Quarter, 1997, mixed
media assemblage, 37 x 46 x 7 in., Courtesy of the artist and
Catharine Clark Gallery
Mary Daniel Hobson, Flight, 1998, mixed
media in frame, 6 x 6 in., Courtesy of the artist 
Catie O’Leary, Untitled (birds), 1999, collage, 10 ½
x 10 ¼ in.
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Perhaps more than any other art form, collage remains completely accessible. Most of us can remember creating collages as young children by pasting together bits of magazines and construction paper. Because of this, the medium of collage continues to represent a symbol of aesthetic freedom and versatility.
However, the accessibility of collage is underscored by the fact that it has been used as an avant-garde strategy for much of the 20th century. Most recently, there has been a veritable flowering of work in this medium. What contemporary artists find appealing about the medium is similar to that which has appealed to artists throughout the Modernist period. Collage offers an opportunity for artists to revel in “base” or mundane materials, raising them to the level of “high” art.
In addition, by its very nature, collage juxtaposes unrelated objects and images to form completely new meanings. But for contemporary artists, there are other issues at play. Through their use of pre-existing materials, contemporary artists using collage make reference to postmodern strategies of appropriation, questioning the notions of artistic authenticity and originality. Moreover, it is difficult to consider a contemporary collage, with its bits of assembled “junk,” without thinking of the timely issues ofconsumption, waste, and environmentalism.
This exhibition will feature the very best in contemporary collage and assemblage, with a particular focus on Bay Area artists. Cut, Copy, Paste is being presented in conjunction with, and as a follow-up to, the San Jose ICA’s exhibition on digital collage, Bytes and Pieces, which closed on April 5, 2003.