Lateral Thinking in My Collage for LMAC #215

This week's collage represents a convergence of two communities I moderate: @letsmakeacollage (LMAC) and @theinkwell. The template picture for the LMAC collage contest this week featured a circus tent, and the fiction prompt for the Inkwell community was "Clown".

Here is the LMAC template, author @shaka

My relating the two prompts is probably a good example of the way I often use lateral thinking. This is not a conscious process. Concepts come together in a kind of idea environment.

Certainly the way those ideas come together is influenced by events in one's life. Currently, I'm dealing with some rather grim events--life's less rosy aspect. Last week I posted a blog about a vampire's existential crisis and today I post a collage that shows a grotesque clown peering down on helpless humans. These small, relatively helpless actors are unaware of the menace.

Lateral thinking. Two prompts and life come together to make a not entirely uplifting collage. This sort of lateral thinking is said by some to be at the core of creative activity. Whether it is or not, lateral thinking is obviously partly responsible for what I produced today.

The grimacing clown is I think not typical of where most of my collages go.

Resources used in making this collage included the template, photos from Unsplash, Pixabay, Pexels, and most significantly images from the LIL Gallery, LMAC's dedicated image resource. I thank in particular my friends at LMAC, @yaziris, @muelli, and @redheadpei.

Contributors:

• Clown
  https://unsplash.com/photos/black-and-white-lion-painting-M98DitdZi0Q

• Juggler
  https://pixabay.com/sv/vectors/cirkus-clown-skrattande-jonglering-160165/

• Contortionist
  https://www.pexels.com/photo/circus-actor-performance-14145587/

• Woman in costume
  https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-in-a-costume-jumping-midair-in-a-city-street-14139791/

• Ringmaster
  https://pixabay.com/sv/vectors/cirkus-man-person-skrattande-152870/

• Broom
  @yaziris
  https://www.lmac.gallery/lil-gallery-image/7638

• Weird figure
  @muelli
  https://www.lmac.gallery/lil-gallery-image/6530

• Jester
  @redheadpei
  https://www.lmac.gallery/lil-gallery-image/6783

I used the programs Paint, Paint 3D and Gimp to put the different pieces of the collage together. I finished the surreal effect with a filter from Lunapic.

I had to separate the tent from the template, enlarge it and open its doors. Paint 3D was extremely helpful in this process:

I had to find the right clown, separate him from his background and make him even creepier with with red, spiky hair. I placed him menacingly over the tent.

Time to add my 'players'. I kept thinking of the quote from Shakespeare:
All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;

In each case I had to separate the 'players' from their backgrounds. In the case of the jester, I combined a body supplied by @muelli with a head supplied by @redheadpei.

I placed the broom by @yaziris in the hands of the ringmaster to make him more absurd.

The hardest part for me was getting the proportions of the players right. I have trouble with visual spacing perception (takes me a long time to park a car), but it worked out fairly well.

In the end, the filter from Lunapic (fantasy filter), helped me to achieve the effect I was going for.

LIL is not only a valuable image resource for the Hive community, but is also a way for community members to participate in LMAC. Anyone on Hive can contribute to the library and everyone can borrow from it. Learn about the procedure here.

Every week we offer prizes to fifteen finalists in the contest, but it's not only the prizes people create for. I personally spend hours giving vent to my imagination, though I don't compete in the contest. Others in the community have also developed the habit of 'speaking' through collage.

This week's contest has not yet concluded. Collages will be accepted for competition until tomorrow evening. However, anyone can make a collage, freestyle, anytime and post it in the community, outside of competition. We love art :)

As @shaka has said many times, everyone is an artist. I may not be an artist in the technical sense, but LMAC allows me to nurture my own unique artistic voice.

Thank you for reading. Peace and health to all.