collage

In art, the use of various materials, such as pieces of newspaper, fabric, and wallpaper, to create a picture or design by sticking them on canvas or another suitable surface, often in combination with painted or drawn features.

The technique was used in scrapbooks in the 19th century and was first seriously adopted by artists in the early 20th century. In 1912 Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso became the first major artists to use and promote collage, and it soon became a distinctive feature of cubism. Subsequently it has featured prominently in several movements, particularly Dada and surrealism, in which the technique was extended to include three-dimensional objects. Among Dadaists, Kurt Schwitters made collage his life's work, creating his own version called Merz, which used everyday rubbish such as used bus tickets and pieces of string. Among the surrealists, the most well-known artist to use collage was probably Max Ernst, who fitted together cuttings from 19th-century engravings to form new, mismatched images that he arranged in ‘collage novels’. Among later collage artists, one of the most original was the Italian Alberto Burri, whose work often includes pieces of sacking.