Collage
![oh wait collagecover oh wait collagecover](http://jeanmcewan.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/oh-wait-collagecover.png)
One of my favourite writers, Rebecca Solnit says in her book The Faraway Nearby
We never tell the story whole because a life isn’t a story; it’s a whole Milky Way of events and we are forever picking out constellations from it to fit who and where we are.
I often think of this when I’m making collage. The process of cutting out, of arranging and rearranging different elements, serves as a means of being able to create, and recreate meaning – whatever is needed for this moment, this day.
I also use collage a lot when I’m working with other people to support their creativity – as it is such a democratic, accessible and rewarding ways of making images. Collage can reflect the complexity, messiness, and contingency of human experience. Through arranging, placing, and remixing of visual elements, we can speak in a different language about ourselves and our experiences. We can discover, or rediscover, what’s important to us, what we know, and who we are.
Watch a presentation about my collage practice recorded for the 2020 online Collage Colloquium hosted by London Centre for Book Arts in association with The Centre for Fine Print Research.
Collisions Book
![Collissions cover collisions book](http://jeanmcewan.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Collissions-cover.jpg)
Collisions is a book of photocollage work by Jean, made in collaboration with and published by Gordian Projects in 2020.
The book presents recent collage work, interspersed with a conversation between Brian Lewis of Longbarrow Press, Jean and Tom Rodgers, co-editor at Gordian Projects, and is available here.
Altered Artforum collages
An ongoing series of collage works begun in 2018 made with found copies of Artforum magazine chanced upon in a charity shop in Hebden Bridge.
These works were featured in the Relaunch Issue One of online art, sound & writing journal SoAnyway
Altered Postcards
Collages made with found postcards, an ongoing series since 2015.
Occasionally available to buy here