Reimagined
I enjoy assembling collages. We see many thousands of objects every day in our day-to-day activities, and we see so many items every day that most of the time people do not have the time to look closely at the details in the items which we see or use in our day-to-day activities. There are a lot colors, textures, and patterns in the items which we see or use every day which people rarely seem to notice.
For me, assembling collages is a means of viewing many of the items which we see or use in our lives on a daily basis within entirely new contexts- perhaps you could consider these photos to be “everyday objects, reimagined,” or “recontextualized.”
The first two images in this series are photographs of two collages which I’d assembled from postage stamps which have been issued by the post offices in various countries throughout the world. Each of the postage stamps which I’ve included within these 2 collages includes photos of famous artists, portraits of various artists, authorized reprints of famous paintings, or photos of sculptures- so, each of these postage stamps represents various artists’ visions of how they’d been attempting to express their visions of the world that we live in.
The third image is a collage which I’d assembled from 3 commemorative coins. One of the coins which you see in this photo was minted in Russia, one of these commemorative coins is from the PRC, and one of the coins which I’d used to assemble this collage was minted in the U.S. These 3 coins each commemorate space exploration missions, so this collage is intended to illustrate a potential vision for the future- an era when it may once again become possible for former Cold War era rivals to resume sharing their technologies which are involved in space exploration with each other.
The fourth picture in this series is a collage which I’d assembled from vintage transit tokens, some of which are approximately 100 years old. I assembled this collage with the intention that this will be a visual counterpoint to the previous image; while the third image in this series illustrates transit technologies which will likely become commonplace in future years, the 4th image in this series illustrates transportation technologies from the past.
The next 2 images are two collages which I’d assembled from astronaut mission patches. I’d assembled these two images with the intent that these images would inspire the viewers to contemplate future technologies associated with space exploration.
The seventh photo is a collage that I’ve assembled from dials and gauges. This image is intended to represent chaos- entities which would never appear in the same place: I’d assembled this collage by taking photos of dials and gauges from aviation, from boats, from automobiles, cartography equipment, gauges from scuba tanks, and gauges from furnaces, and I merged the individual images together.
The eighth image in this series is a collage which I’ve assembled from some of the shells from my seashell collection. This image is intended to illustrate my perception of sea waves; I selected shells with veination patters which would (hopefully) appear graceful when viewed together, assembled in the positions that I’ve placed them.
The ninth image is a collage which I’ve assembled from gears, cogs, cams, and flywheels which were salvaged when various pieces of vintage agricultural machinery had been disassembled for scrap metal recycling.
The tenth photo in this series is a collage which I’d assembled from kitchen countertop tile samples- and then I used the “liquify tool” in Adobe Elements to create the shapes which we see in this image.
The 11th photo in this series is a collage which I’d assembled from plastic filters which some photographers used to place on the ends of our lenses way back in the 35mm era. In the 21st century, many photographers prefer to use software to create abstract effects in the images that we assemble; only a relatively small handful of photographers still prefer to work with 35mm equipment these days. However, I decided that there still might be some potential artistic use for filters which had originally been designed for use with 35mm lenses, I repurposed these filters as props in this collage.
The 12th photo is a collage which assembled from a collection of motherboards from desktop tower units which had become obsolete. Again, I used the “liquify tool” to create the patters and the shapes which we see in this image.
When viewing the collages that I enjoy assembling from postage stamps, coins, tokens, patches, etc., viewers certainly do have every right to inquire whether I believe that the graphic designers who work at agencies within the post offices, the mints, the transit authorities, or the graphic design units within the space agencies in the respective countries in which these items had originally been manufactured have already accomplished half of the artistic work in these images. For me, the artistry is the process of selecting which items will work well with each other for creating a final composition which will appear graceful to the viewers, and deciding the specific spaces within a collage to insert each of the individual items. This involves looking closely at the colors, the textures and the patterns which are present within each of the items that I’m opting to include in the collages that I assemble, and subsequently deciding where to place each of the items in relation to each other.
The graphic designers who had originally designed the postage stamps, tokens, commemorative coins and patches as well as the engineers who had created the gears, cogs, cams and the flywheels which I’ve used in assembling these collages never intended for these items to be used for artistic collages when they designed these items- for me the part of the artistic process involves repurposing and upcycling items for purposes which the people who had initially manufactured them would likely never have intended.
In addition to creating my own images, I also always enjoy viewing artwork. I always make a point to tour some museums when I travel in cities throughout the world. Many museums are buildings which had been constructed in earlier centuries to which modern architects have added new wings in recent years. In many instances, the boards of directors of museums seem to hire very skilled architects. I’ve been very impressed with the architecture which I see when I tour museums in various cities when I travel. In many instances, the connection between the new wings and the oldest parts of the buildings flows so gracefully that the entire building is a work of art unto itself.
The 13th photo in this series is a photo which I took in 2018 when I’d toured the Four Domes Pavilion Museum branch of the National Museum of Poland in Wroclaw (the “Muzeum Narodowe we Wrocławiu”); this is the inner courtyard of the museum.
The final 2 photos which I’m including here are two photos which I took in 2022 when I toured The Grand Duke Jean Museum of Modern Art in Luxembourg City, Luxembourg (the (“Musée d’Art Moderne Grand-Duc Jean”- the “MUDAM Museum”); these are views of the inner courtyard of this museum.
For people who are curious about the specific equipment which I used when I assembled these images: I’d photographed most of these images using a Kodak model # Z5010 camera, and I usually use Adobe Elements to create the finished versions of my images.
I am a hobbyist photographer. I possess citizenship in both the U.S. and Israel, and these days, I attempt to divide my time between the Middle East and the U.S. equally each year when possible.
I do not have my own website. If anyone is interested in asking me about any of these 15 photos, feel free to write to me through my meta/ facebook page:
www.facebook.com/scott.benowitz.18
If anyone has any questions about the specific techniques, tools, effects, and filters which I’d used to assemble each of these collages, please do feel free to ask, I will respond.
