Patrick Bremer currently lives and works in Berlin. He was born in 1982 in Brighton and studied painting at Wimbledon College of Art in London. Here he experimented using collaging as a medium due to the high cost of paint. He produced portraits of people exploring the boundaries of collage using books from second hand stores, car boot sales and old magazines and newspapers. Using a stack of old magazines ready to be thrown he has found a clever way of utilising these for his artwork.
Said by Bremer “Working with paper still had a similar feel to paint, and I always try to use the knife in a similar way to a paintbrush, and cut shapes that feel like streaks of wet paint.” (Artconnet Berlin 2013).
Bremer has achieved recognition for his experimental portraits and figures and his work has been exhibited in numerous exhibitions throughout Europe and South Korea. At Wimbledon School of Art in London he received his BFA and for his figurative work he won The DeLazlo Foundation Award from The Royal Society of Portrait Painters for his figurative work.
The piece takes shape by the use of colours and lines that appears in the paper available. Text, stories and imagery from a collection of different sources have been used in the collage. Combined together with the help of the artist, they create their own narrative stories on the canvas. The portrait is in strong contrast to the dark background and Bremer has used a mixture of both warm and cold colours. The bottom of the collage is created using warm and vibrant colours including red, orange and yellow. Different textures have been added to the collage by using different scenes such as, space, fields and buildings. Creating highlights by using a huge variation of light colours he has made it look like a natural portrait. It could almost look like the woman has got a spot- light directed onto her face. Strips of paper horizontally covering the woman’s face cleverly represent her hair. The woman’s face is dominating the collage and looks to have appeared from the unknown. There are a number of different interpretations of this collage however I feel that the character portrays a sultry, dominant look by the way her head is tilted back and how the mouth is slightly open. This combined with the strong lines and movements; the collage has an explosive undertone. It could be said that composing this image Bremer wanted to draw the viewer’s attention to her lips and eye.
Bremer’s use of vibrant colours is something I will look into gathering sources for my own collaging piece. I will experiment with magazines, newspapers and prints out from the Internet. I will consider using different shapes of ripped and cut sources such as long strips of paper etc.
Image Lab Madeleine Page 