This project was inspired by how society reacts to printed images. Reading a magazine or newspaper has become an escape from our surroundings. The Portland Collage places images from printed matter into the everyday reality of living. Isolating the printed images from their credits and captions calls attention to the pure act of seeing these pictures. By placing a familiar image where one would not expect to see it, I hope to challenge our reactions both to reading a magazine and experiencing everyday life. The attention an image receives when reading a magazine has suddenly been placed on the signpost walked by every day. Does the experience of the printed image change? Does the signpost become more important? I hope to expose this separating of our detachment from what we call reality and how we escape it to reclaim the joy and meaning in everyday life.

The city of Portland provides enormous possibilities for the placing of images. What would normally be passed over as an incidental coincidence of stickers or grafitti becomes charged with the possibility of a thread of meaning. The window opens to accept every visual situation as a possibility to evoke a message, and the entire city becomes a saturated field for the project to interact with.

This is an ongoing project, check back for updates.