Last week I received an email from a teacher, Amanda, from Lancashire, England. She sent me images of collages her students were working on. The 7 and 8 year olds worked in pairs using my “painting with paper” technique to create collages based on animal illustrations from the covers of books written by Michael Morpurgo. Morpurgo is an English author, poet, and playwright that the students were also studying in school.
Below you will find the students’ collage work on the left, with the illustration their work was based on below the collage:
I was very impressed by this group’s work. Especially since the students are so young, and were able to do such a great job of mixing textures with solid colors in their collages. It definitely made my day getting to see their artwork.
“Watchful Tiger.” Collage on paper. 16″x12″ Order a print
I’ve been taking a bit of a break from my art-making so I can unwind and experiment with other media. However, I’m still working away on collages here and there. This week I completed my latest commission, a tiger collage. The client had purchased my “Watchful Lion” collage, and was interested in getting a tiger collage to go along with it. She also wanted a sunset in the background of the composition.
So as I worked on this piece, I kept a thumbnail image of the “Watchful Lion” in front of me so I could make sure the new collage would look related to the previous piece. This one was definitely a fun piece to work on. I really enjoyed using all the bright colors.
It’s been a while since Bosty’s last trip, so he decided to head south before it gets too hot. Bosty isn’t a fan of hot, humid summers.
The first thing he did when he arrived, was visit the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. Actually, he really wanted to go restaurant hopping to eat lots of southern dishes – but I told him we had to make a few museum stops first.
So up next we visited by the National WWII Museum to get a history lesson.
Then we walked around before grabbing a bite to eat. We admired all the murals on different buildings.
Bosty really liked the banners on all the lamp posts. Especially the ones that told bikers to watch out for open car doors. He really appreciates safety signage.
Finally we made it to a restaurant in the Garden District for dinner. Bosty decided to have chicken. I was surprised he didn’t order gumbo or a po’ boy.
After dinner we wandered down a few streets in the Garden District and admired the brightly colored homes with high windows and large front porches. All-in-all, Bosty was very satisfied with yet another day out and about in a different city.
This month my artwork is on display in a group exhibit at Tryst. The exhibit features the work of three D.C. area artists who are part of the Bourgeon book project. Five of my landscape/cityscape pieces are included in the show.
This past Thursday was the opening reception for the exhibit. A big thank you to everyone who attended and those who were also hard at work organizing the show.
The Examiner recently wrote an article about the exhibit and artists, which you can view here. The photos from this blog post were all taken by the writer when she was attending the opening.
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 9th, 2013 from 7:00p.m. – 9:00p.m.
Coyle recently had her article “Megan Coyle on her Collage Portraiture” and an image of her artwork published in the book Bourgeon: Fifty Artist Write About Their Work. In celebration of the book’s publication, three of the book’s authors are exhibiting their artwork in a group show at Tryst in Adams Morgan. The exhibiting artists include Megan Coyle, Camille Mosley-Pasley, and Michele Banks.
Five of Coyle’s landscape/cityscape collages will be on display. Most of the pieces in the show were created when Coyle was working on a series for her “D.C. Collage Scapes” exhibit at the Arts Club of Washington back in February.
Copies of the Bourgeon book will be available for sale at the opening.
Last week I found out that one of my collages was featured on Conan O’Brien’s official website and all of his social media sites. Apparently it was featured on the homepage of his website too, but I didn’t get around to realizing it until a couple days after it was posted.
It’s always great when your work gets a bit of attention – and it’s even better when a celebrity shares your work. Anyway, it was amusing reading over comments by people who liked and disliked the piece.
The collage itself was completed over a year ago. I made it specifically for Conan’s website when I realized there was a Coco Moca section where they posted artwork of Conan. So it was my first attempt at trying to create him in collage form.
“Trip to the Mountains.” Collage on paper. 12″x16″
Last Thursday I stopped by the Vienna Arts Society in Vienna, Virginia to present and demo my “painting with paper” technique. I talked about my work for a bit, then proceeded to make a slightly abstract 12″x16″ collage. The other day I finished the collage, which you can find to the left.
The presentation was a lot of fun. Thank you to everyone who made it out that day. I enjoyed sharing my work, telling you all a little about myself, and sharing my children’s book Duck & Fish.
“Air Force Memorial.” Collage on paper. 12″x16″ Order a print
The “D.C. Collage Scapes” exhibit closed this past weekend. On Sunday I stopped by the gallery to pick up my work. I was pleased to see that several collages had found new homes, including the ones pictured in this blog post.
“Calm Afternoons.” Collage on paper. 12″x16″ Order a print
Thanks again to everyone who made it out to see the show, and who made it such a great success! This will actually be one of my last big exhibits for a while – I’m planning to take things easy in the upcoming months. I’m looking forward to experimenting with different mediums and finding new ways of being creative. It’s time to change things up a bit.
“The U.S. Capitol by Night.” Collage on paper. 12″x16″ Order a print
The other day I stopped by my parents’ house to go through some of my old things. This included a stack of artwork that I created over the years. I got a kick out of several of my old drawings. Some were amusing and some were impressive, considering how old I was when I created them. It’s no wonder I became an artist.
By Megan Coyle when she was a child
The piece above was done when I was about twelve (I think). It’s interesting how I made an oil pastel drawing look a little bit like a collage of sorts.
By Megan Coyle when she was a childBy Megan Coyle when she was a child
The watercolor above was done when I was in middle school. I made a watercolor where I outlined the dogs and shapes in the background with marker. Then I cut the pieces up into strips and glued them onto a piece of black construction paper.
By Megan Coyle when she was a childBy Megan Coyle at age 6
This drawing made me smile. Apparently when I was about six, I decided to make a series of drawings just like this one. The super tall lady wearing a long dress, holding a frilly umbrella, while walking her tiny dog on a leash was a reoccurring character in my drawings.
By Megan Coyle when she was a child
Above is one of the few mountainous landscapes I made as a child.
Every summer for a few years my family used to travel up to Maine. We would stay in a cottage by the ocean that didn’t have a TV, which forced my older brother and me to find ways to entertain ourselves. I decided to start creating a little world of paper critters that I would cut out of paper. Then I created different settings for them so I could move them around to act out different stories. My brother caught on to the paper world I was creating and decided to turn it into a collaboration. Above and below are all the various creatures we drew.
And below is an example of one of the settings we made. In this case it’s a restaurant, where we could move the animal character cut-outs around. It was sort of like having an elaborate set of paper dolls.
This past Thursday was the opening reception for the exhibit. A big thank you to everyone who attended and those who were also hard at work organizing the show.
