I was the featured artist at our recent quarterly Open Studios at the Mill, held on February 13. My show focused on a series of revamped and new Salvage Collages as well as some acrylic paintings done on book board covers, utilizing my materials in a new way. I worked on pieces feverishly right up until it was time to get the show hung.
Artist Statement about my Salvage Collages:
Dayna Collins has always loved old books. She hyperventilates at the sight of books which are stained, defaced, torn or marked up. She rips battered books apart, reclaiming their faded fragments, and creates collages using only materials she has excavated. Dayna’s mixed media pieces reflect the passage of time, repurposing the scraps that are worn and weathered, transforming the aged and tattered pieces into something unexpected and beautiful, celebrating their fragile decay.
My husband hung my show in two stages, and it turns out he has quite a knack for curating and hanging.
The end result was quite nice.
Some of the pieces in the show:
And some of the paintings on book boards:
Many thanks to those who stopped in to say hello, and to Luis Noriega for attending our Open Studios and interviewing some of our artists for his podcast: Down the Rabbit Hole DTRH Podcast
Head’s Up: Next opportunity to see my Salvage Collages will be at a Pop – Up in July in Astoria, Oregon!
I’m pleased to share that I currently have an exhibition of my Salvage Collages at Willamette University’s Hatfield Library. My show, Salvage Collage: A Sort of Magic, is on view through January 20, 2020. It is always a thrill to show at the library, where I used to work 20 years ago.
Leading up to my exhibition, I was feverishly creating new work and revamping some old pieces to give them new life.
On the day of hanging, I used book carts to get my boxes and suitcases to the second floor of the Hatfield Library.
Then I spread everything out and began the process of stacking books in the cases and auditioning where to put the assorted Salvage Collages.
After a couple of hours, my work was complete.
The public is welcome to visit the library (and my exhibit) during library hours.The best place to park is on State Street, where there is metered parking (Willamette is located right across the street from the State Capitol). While you are at the library, check out the Pacific Northwest Artists Archives, which is right next to the two cases where my exhibition is. There is also some great art on the first and second floors by regional artists.
The opening reception for my show (with ceramic artist Michelle Gallagher) at Guardino Gallery, was on Thursday, July 25. It was a warm evening and lots of people were out enjoying art and the festivities of Last Thursday on Alberta.
The official photos:
Michelle Gallagher, Donna Guardino, and me
The unofficial photos:
Friends!Alea and meHoward chats with Stacey and FredGreg Carrigan catching up with friendsHoward and Donna watch the festivities of Last Thursday on AlbertaWith my daughter AmyStan and BobbieGrandson Major ponders the artHoward and Steph
Thank you to everyone who came out for the opening and for those who have been visiting since the show opened.
Once a quarter, on the second Thursday of the month, Studios at the Mill host Art After Dark where we fling open our doors, serve refreshments, and celebrate the arts in our neck of the woods.
We are located on the second floor of the Wool Warehouse at the Willamette Heritage Center, which is across the street from both the Amtrak station and Willamette University, in the heart of Salem. We have 10 artists and everyone opened their door on the evening of April 12th. My studio is located in the NW corner, overlooking the Mill Stream, which runs through the WHC campus. Here’s one of my windows looking up from the outside.
I use my studio at the Mill for special projects since my painting studio is at my home. I love having a space devoted to working with paper, ephemera, book covers, black and white photos, and scraps . . . . all of which I call Salvage Collage.
Of course, I spruced up my space for this quarterly event. It is ever evolving and I love moving things around, touching everything, hanging things, and getting side tracked auditioning various pieces for ongoing projects. Here are photos of my spiffed up studio:
It is always more fun when people are added to the mix.
Our next Art After Dark is Thursday, July 12, 6-8 pm. If you’d like to be added to our studio newsletter e-mailing list, please send me your e-mail address: dayna@alleyartstudio.com
Last October, I taught a one-day workshop titled What’s Your Story, Real or Imagined: Telling Stories Through Black and White Photos. It was very successful and I had several artists tell me they wanted to take it if I offered again. I decided to turn the one-day workshop into two days and to hold it at The Art Studios at Mission Mill, where I have a studio.
I limited the class size to four participants so we would have plenty of room to move around in the smallish classroom. Both workshops filled quickly as I contacted everyone who had mentioned they were interested.
The two workshops were a blur of energy and activity. Rather than try and share the individual workshops, I’m just going to post a series of photos which represent the frenzy of creativity that took place the last two weekends of January.
On our first day, everyone created a series of backgrounds using acrylic paint, a variety of pencils, inks, plaster, and stains. On day two, mixed media collages were created using vintage letters, envelopes, and ephemera, and then a black and white photograph was added – either the photo of a stranger from my stash, or a photo of a relative, brought by the student.
Show and tell. Just a sampling of the collages created over the two weekends.
Once a quarter, The Art Studios at Mission Mill, host Art After Dark/Open Studios. Our most recent event was January 11th. I was the featured artist in the studio gallery/classroom and I decided in addition to hanging some of my recent work, I would offer a mini workshop on creating a modified What’s Your Story mixed media collage. I set up some of the walls in the gallery as teaching walls. One wall told the history of the project, another showed samples of possible backgrounds, and then one wall showed the progression from blank 140 lb. watercolor paper to finished mixed media collages. (The other two walls were my most recent work using old, defaced books, but I’ll share those pieces in a separate post.)
I created three small sample collages, done using original letters, envelopes, and an assortment of ephemera, along with photocopies of black and white photographs.
With my guidance, guests were invited to create a little mixed media collage.
All ages participated, and Alex sat and read old letters to us during the evening.
Of course, sometimes the adults found it difficult to resist reading the letters.
Some of the collages created during the evening event.
All of this was a great set up and preparation for last weekend, when I taught the first of my two-day full length What’s Your Story, Real of Imagined workshop. I’ll be doing a post about my workshops in the coming days.
Back in August of 2016, I was offered an Artist in Residence position at the Salem Art Association’s new Art Annex. Today I moved into my studio space, which I will call home for the next month.Here’s a description of what I’ll be doing:
Artist in Residence/Dayna Collins
October 25-November 24
Dayna Collins is a collector, energized by hunting for worn out and discarded objects, especially the bits and pieces that aren’t perfect. She hyperventilates when she discovers a box of ephemera or an old photo album that someone is throwing away. During her residency, Dayna will bring her vast collection of old letters, photographs, ticket stubs, bits of vintage lace, envelopes, stamps, string, travel brochures, maps, recipes, report cards, random notes – the detritus of a person’s life – and create vignettes that tell a story. Using paper, paint, cardboard, book covers, and plaster, she will give new life to these cast off, expendable objects, exploring storytelling in unexpected ways, beginning with a black and white photograph of a stranger.
Moved into my temporary studio space today at Salem Art Association’s Art Annex.
Dropped my stuff, then figured out where everything should go.
I brought so much stuff!
Utilizing every space, nook, and cranny.
Stacks, piles, and rows.
NOTE: I’ll be in the studio most weekdays and the public is invited to stop by and see what I’m working on. I will be posting on my personal Facebook page the days and times I will be in the Art Annex Studio. I’ll have these posts set to public, so if you’re thinking about visiting, please take a look to see if I’ll be there: Dayna Davidson Collins
In addition to the residency, there are several upcoming events.
Exhibit Reception
Saturday, November 18/4-6 pm/FREE
Symbols are personal. Oftentimes they’re stories that incorporate one’s religious, cultural and familial imagery. These things often prod memories and ideas, bringing to the surface the roots of our ancestry, and other events, times, or places in our lives. This exhibition focuses on artistic interpretations of symbols that are pertinent to family history, holidays or spiritual rituals, heritage and culture.
Participating artists are Dayna Collins, Toni Gilbert, Sarah Dillon Gilmartin, Ann Kresge, Eric Loftin, Susan Napack, Nichole Rose, Jennifer Salzman and Vicky DeKrey Vasey.
Panel Discussion
Friday, October 27/5-7 pm
Please join Ross Sutherland (Bush House Museum), Toni Gilbert (author), Dayna Collins (artist), Kylie Pine (Willamette Heritage Center) and Amber D’Ambrosio (University Archive, Willamette University) in a conversation about our personal objects, ranging from how to properly care for them using professional methods, examples of how larger organizations approach personal objects, how we can use some of these methods for our own personal objects and family histories, and how we can utilize our personal and family imagery through art.
Workshop (class is full)
What’s Your Story, Real or Imagined: Telling Stories Through Old Photos
Saturday, October 28/9:30 am – 4:30 pm
Ancestors. We all have them, but do we know their stories. In this class, we’ll build a story based on a black and white photo — real relatives or “adopted” ones. We will create aged backgrounds using paint and stains, then build a collaged vignette using old letters, ephemera, envelopes, lace, tape, trim, string, and a variety of lightweight found objects. Working in a grid, everyone will create a patchwork quilt of stories, which we’ll put together in honor of those who came before us.
In addition to all of this excitement, I’ll be interviewed on Thursday for a local television station and then on Friday, November 10th, I’ll be on Joel Zak’s KMUZ radio show, Talking About Art, sharing about my project and Artist in Residence. More about all of this later.
The artists at the Art Studios at Mission Mill decided at the end of last year that they wanted to host quarterly Open Studios rather than monthly events. I personally liked having them monthly, but they did seem to roll around rather quickly. Our quarterly event, under the umbrella of Art After Dark, will be held this Thursday, April 13, from 6-8 pm (a change from our old time of 5-7 pm). Studio A, where I hang out, has been converted to my Special Project Studio, where I am working on a big mixed media and collage project titled: What’s Your Story, Real or Imagined: Telling Stories through Black and White Photos. I started this project last year, but it has been evolving and morphing into something bigger than I earlier anticipated. I still have my two walls of black and white photos, which have expanded and taken over more real estate.
I recently had the opportunity to sort through a couple dozen boxes and three chests of family photos and ephemera and somehow I managed to find room in my compact corner space for piles and mounds of paper, 3-D bits, and photos.
I’ll be doing an Artist in Residence at the Salem Art Association Annex in the fall, so for now, my ideas are percolating as I spend time in this special studio. I’ll be sharing more about my fall project a bit later, but it includes a panel discussion, two weeks of working in a spacious light-filled studio, and will culminate in a one-day workshop I’ll be teaching. In the meantime, come see my newest acquisitions and hear more about my project on Thursday night.
ART AFTER DARK
The Art Studios at Mission Mill are located at the Willamette Heritage Center, across from Willamette University on 12th Street and across from the Amtrak Train Station on Mill Street. All of the second floor studios will be open, Carol Green will be demonstrating a Polaroid emulsion lift process (“The World Through Polaroid Imagining”), and Bonnie Hull is bringing her instant camera and will be taking curated photos ($1, please bring exact change). There will be new art on the communal walls and all of the artists will be serving refreshments. On the first floor, Max Marbles, the bookbinder, will be open, the Eco Hub is featuring student artwork honoring nature, and you can meet the newest tenants: award-winning photographer Frank Barnett and his wife, 3D artist and writer, Mart Soloman. It’s going to be a splendid night!
Our December Art After Dark was cancelled last month due to snow and ice, so I’m happy to announce that it has been rescheduled for Thursday, January 12, 2017, 5-7 pm. The artists at the Art Studios at Mission Mill voted to go to quarterly Open Studios, so please join us as our next event won’t be for a few months. As you can see from the flier, we have a full line up of art and activities on the first and second floors.
I’m excited to share a project that I’ve been working on for many months. Someone recently asked me where the idea came from and I realized it has actually been in the works for years. I told them: It has been inside me for a long time and most of my mixed media art has been leading up to this special project, although I didn’t know it at the time.
It was 2007 when I created a class called Itty Bitty Pretties. It involved creating little tiny mini collages on 1-1/2 x 1-1/2 inch squares: a background, a cut out black and white photograph, a word, and finally, an assemblage piece; each one represented a different family member. Here is 64.
It has been inside me for a long time and most of my mixed media art has been leading up to this special project, although I didn’t know it at the time.
Jump ahead to 2012, when I started creating mixed media collages on playing and flash cards. During the summer of that year I lived on a boat at the Portland Waterfront for 29 days; I created a card for each day I was there.
In the fall of 2015, I made a travel journal in the style of my current project, creating about 60 pre painted pages, which I embellished throughout the 40 days I was gone.
At the beginning of this year, I started to lay the framework for an idea to take all of these past projects and incorporate them into a new one. It gets a bit blurry about the timing. I remember working on page backgrounds when we went to Arizona in February, where I slathered paint and created texture using plaster and gesso, always writing and embedding text into the wet paint and over the dry plaster.
I remember returning to my studio and beginning the process of gathering textiles, ephemera, and little found objects to eventually incorporate into my collage pieces. I also began gathering dozens of black and white photographs, mostly of strangers.
In May of this year, I went on an art retreat with my Portland Art Collective, where I spent three days composing and auditioning layouts.
After returning from the retreat, I continued building my collages and gave them a name, What’s your Story, Real or Imagined: Telling Stories Through Black & White Photos. My collection of ephemera expanded, as did my obsession with black and white photographs.
I continued building my collages and gave them a name, What’s your Story, Real or Imagined: Telling Stories Through Black & White Photos. My collection of ephemera expanded, as did my obsession with black and white photographs.
These are a sampling of my mixed media collages and all are a work in progress. When I’m at my studio, I am continually digging through my bits and auditioning that one more thing to add another layer of interest and mystery.
My plan is to continue working on these pages and in the fall of 2017, I’ll be offering a workshop at Salem Art Association’s Art Annex in conjunction with a collaborative history project, which is in the works.
