Collages 6x6, 8.5x11 and 300 more words

8 6X6 Collages
5 8.5x11 Collages About my creation process in gathering and using the images: I paid a visit to the Milwaukee Maker Space: http://milwaukeemakerspace.org/ . I was drawn to capturing images that had bold colors and repetitive textures: piles of mechanical pieces, rows of spools of wire, buttons, keypads, tools hanging on a peg board. I felt like I would be able to use these images in collage and also they speak to the “maker” culture, being supplied for any project. Sharing their tools, parts, pieces and equipment it is all displayed and organized. My feeling on the layout of my collages was it should be energetic, gritty and also a mix between carefree nature and the intensity that is used to invent and create. I used a lot of layering to achieve color and grit or contrast. Some of the layouts have a silly aspect to them like the wrench and the gun. Referencing the making of guns on the 3-d printer; just to push the limits. There is a childlike charm to the community there. And so I decided to use a layout plan for building a gun in my collage with part of the wrench from their logo and a chalk board. I also used an image of a tiny 3-d robot design printout from a 3-d printer. There was a huge amount of images of toys that are made there or robots and creations resembling toys, like Fido, the dog robot that fetches and their power wheels racing cars, not to mention they have a hacked pinball machine. I got pictures of all these things, but did not want to use blatant imagery. There is a lot going on all the time. It can get loud, and the place it packed with the colors and forms of machinery and tools used to create. I thought my collages could also reflect that organized chaos with layering but I did not focus on any one area or process, but simply gave a visual idea of what it feels like to walk through the place. The other thing is that there are all types of grime everywhere since people are always working, so this is where I wanted the grittiness to come in the collages. Using layering and contrast to show the feeling of work in progress and getting dirty. Below are a few pictures I took while at the Milwaukee Maker Space to give you a sense of the space. Note: I only included a few areas of the Warehouse in these pictures because I was looking for more up close pictures to use in collages and also I did not want to disturb some people working. I felt like, for instance, taking pictures of the guys in the wood-shop would have been distracting to them and not safe.

From Playing with the Can Crusher; Milwaukee Maker Space

About Maker Culture: You might have noticed that there has been a resurgence of a culture obsessed with handmade work and DIY projects from robotics to kids toys. It’s not like people haven’t always had ingenuity. The has never been a lack of advancement in technology, but with the internet making information so much easier for us to share, there has been a growing interest in creating communities and therefore enhancing the knowledge and resources of everyone involved. In this way there is a quickening of advancement and a growing number of people feeling like they have the resources to start projects that would have normally just been a plan or even just a daydream. Even better there is not a lot of pressure and competition in these communities. They are focused on using their leisure time to create, and so they want to have fun. It is generally a live and let live environment where people are free to pursue whatever their interests or projects are and welcome to get involved in contributing to group projects. This inviting attitude helps people, of all kinds, to really love being a part of these communities and open up to contributing in knowledge and resources. So the DIY culture, although not anything that you can call “new” is doing a job of adding a greater number of minds in to the creation process and providing this increase of creators and inventors with shared resources and new technology to make ideas reality. The internet is a huge part of why people are able to create these communities and thrive. It is why more and more people are becoming “makers”. They are making the decision to create and then identifying with that growing part of the culture. In the past 15 years there has been a lot of online resources to help people sell what they are making, Etsy and e-bay for example are easy store to set up for very low cost with real results. Building and keeping up your own website is easier than ever, so this helps inspire people to create and sell. It is also frequently said that anything you want to learn how to do, you can pretty much find on the internet. I think it is a safe bet that you will at least find a start online to whatever information you need to do just about any project. If nothing else you will be pointed towards the best source of the information that you need. Knowledge is more accessible than ever before and anyone can essentially do anything that they put their mind to if they are armed with that knowledge and have the resources of a high functioning “maker” community. Also, with social media, networks of “makers” and the dialogue that they exchange is the nutrients that help these communities grow and thrive.

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Walking through the front door you are greeting by the whistle and grind of the circular saw in the woodshop and then the gritty and familiar smell of sawdust and oil. It smells like garage or a workshop, but on a huge scale.

Inventing and creating, for both necessity and for fun is a basic characteristic of who we are as humans. Some say that this DIY culture is nothing new. From a cynical point of view, you could say that these “Maker” people are coming from a culture where everything is ready made and done for you, so they are getting excited about creating and inventing, like it is some kind of new thing. Maybe they are just a club of people with too much time and money on their hands, who just want to rent out a warehouse to store all of their expensive tools and play like children all day. But looking at the emergence of this new culture from a deeper perspective, this idea of creating a community to create brings our advancement of technology full circle. Now that knowledge and tools needed to do just about anything are readily available to just about anyone, we can use what we have learned so far and sit back with a little breathing room to give anyone the opportunity to imagine what we can bring to the future and empower them to deliver it.

Really, there is nothing pretentious about these communities. Although they inevitably include doctors and engineers, they are also havens for students and the average Joe, who want to work with their hands and learn, but may otherwise not have the resources or the tools. Maybe a space will get started by doctors and engineers to build huge spaces with expensive tools, so that they can play, but the spirit of this movement is that spaces are built by the people, for the people. Yes, they are mostly considered social clubs, in the sense that you have to be sponsored and there is a membership fee that helps support the space, but this necessary for a Maker community to be able to sustain their organization. It is open to anyone who wants to join, but not without discretion of the leaders. There is a limit to the number of people who can be in a space and to work as a group, the members should all be mostly comfortable and feel safe around one another. A Maker space is not really a playground, although the analogy is used. There are tools and machines that are expensive and dangerous. You have to follow the rules and behave in a socially acceptable manner.