Gift of Art From a Stranger

by JoAnne McFarland in Sources of Inspiration
     

Gowanus Open Studios October 2016

 
Well, Gowanus Open Studios is done! What a great year. The weather was perfect and we had hundreds of folks come through eager to talk about art, and even buy some work.
 

My Latest Dress Collages

 
I had a great response to my latest dress collages. Here’s the first one that sold, The Mouthing Off Dress:
 
 
 

History of the Dress Collage Series

 
I’ve been making the dress collages for about 20 years now. Earlier ones looked more like this one from 1999, Lonegan’s Dress:
 
 
 

A Material Gift

 
About 10 years ago, someone came in during the Gowanus tour, loved the dress collages, and asked if I wanted some French journals he had called L’ILLUSTRATION from the early 1900s. He sent me a huge stack containing fascinating ads and images:
 
 
 
page after page of articles in French. I’ve used pieces from the journals in the dress collages ever since, and they’ve had a profound effect on my work.
 
Here’s another of the newest ones. It includes part of a food ad I found during my trip to New Orleans earlier this year. The You Make My Mouth Water Dress:
 
 

You Never Know Who Will Touch Your Work (or vice versa)

 
I’m grateful to that stranger (wish I knew his name) for providing me another way into my work.
FOLLOW