Stage 3 2012

Kaloust Guedel made this collage, "Stage 3," with paint and newspaper and who knows what else, and it has a certain organized chaos about it. It's a riot of shapes and colours. Looking closely, you can see how the newspaper elements introduce texture and pattern. See how those shapes at the bottom have been carefully covered with newsprint, like a form of papier-mâché. It's a way of bringing the everyday into the art space, and I like that tension. And that haphazard triangle of bright yellow paint on the right side? It just sings. It’s like a sun peeking through a stormy sky. Guedel reminds me a bit of Kurt Schwitters, who was also into collage and assemblage. But where Schwitters was all about the debris of culture, Guedel seems more interested in the pure act of building, layering, and seeing what happens. Art is always a conversation, and Guedel has got something interesting to say.