A nostalgic approach
Perhaps because time has rendered the imagery, typography and appropriated design elements in early-20th-century collages quaint and antique-looking, many contemporary collage artists have continued to derive the components of their works from sources originating from bygone eras. One such artist represented in this show is Pat Street, whose small, richly colored, nostalgically tinged collages combine antique map fragments, illustrations and typography, as well as iconic art historical imagery.

On about the same scale but more pictorially unified are Jennifer Davis’ narrative scenes incorporating elements of collage and painting. Some of these intriguing, quietly angst-ridden works focus on solitary women engaged in various activities mundane and otherwise, while the rest depict desolate-looking settings devoid of people. Also represented in the show’s collage component are fabric collagists Emily Richardson and Patricia Malarcher, whose works reference the craft of quilt making.

David Brady combines elements of painting and assemblage in his wall-mounted compositions. He has attached configurations of old wires, bird feathers and scraps of wood and metal to expressionistic paintings of murky scenes populated only by figures who seem psychically related to those in Francis Bacon’s paintings.
Jerry Jackson is one of many assemblage artists whose work draws on the shrine and reliquary traditions of Roman Catholicism and other, non-Western religions.

More overt in their religious references are the shrine-influenced assemblages of James Michael Starr. In these somberly poetic works he has conjoined iconic figurines depicting the crucifixion, the Virgin Mary and other emblematic figures with dried roots, antique furniture parts, old photos, print illustrations, a birdcage and a mouse’s treadmill.

In a related vein but smaller and more whimsical are Dale Copeland’s wall-mounted boxed or framed assemblages constructed from old drafting instruments, kitsch objects, clock faces, bird bones and a lizard skeleton, among other objects whose symbolic associations he highlights. Copeland, of New Zealand, is the shows only artist from outside of the United States. His work owes a clear debt to Joseph Cornell’s but is engaging on its own terms nonetheless.

John Garrett weighs in with two pieces that humorously reference the craft of weaving even though they are made of utilitarian metal tools (Builder’s Basket) and brightly colored plastic toys (Field of Dreams).

Finally, the show’s assemblage component is visually dominated by the exuberantly whimsical works of Karl Mann – mostly wall-mounted, trophy-like pieces that he has assembled from dolls, kitsch figurines, taxidermied mammals, machine parts and myriad other items, including busts and other figurines that depict Elvis Presley, Jesus and other iconic figures.

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