EVENT
Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025Kolaj Fest New Orleans is a multi-day festival and symposium, 25-29 June 2025. Our mission is to create a platform that allows us to explore critical issues around collage including how it is curated and presented, its role in contemporary art, and the tensions between collage as a medium, a genre, a community, and a movement. Our goal is to create an event that attracts a variety of people working in various capacities, such as art professionals at museums, galleries, and centers as well as academics, writers, and artists. The general public is invited to join us for gallery visits, evening presentations, and collage making.
CALLS TO ARTISTS
CALL TO ARTISTS
Collage in Practice
Submissions considered on a rolling basis. At Kolaj Institute, we see the book, not just the gallery, as a place to experience collage. This sentiment has broad implications for how collage artists work and how their work is received by an art world whose orientation is decidedly fixed on the gallery wall. In the Collage Publishing Workshop, artists turn a body of work or a project into a zine, art catalog, monograph, or book. We explore different models of publishing and types of book projects and we walk through the steps and support one another as we create publishing projects and prepare to put them out into the world. Sundays, 20 & 27 July and 3 & 10 August 2025, 2-4PM EDT
CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
PoetryXCollage
PoetryXCollage is a printed journal of artwork and writing that operates at the intersection of poetry and collage. Artists and writers interested in submitting should prepare 3-5 page spreads for consideration. Page spreads must conform to exact specifications and include a general artist narrative and a short page spread narrative. Submissions are reviewed on an ongoing basis.
COLLAGE ON VIEW
Kolaj Institute Gallery in New OrleansKolaj Institute Gallery in New Orleans is an exhibition gallery, residency center, artist studio, library and archive. Located at 2374 Saint Claude Avenue, Suite 230, at the corner with St. Roch Avenue above the Peach Cobbler Factory. The Gallery is open Thursday-Saturday, Noon-6PM or by appointment. Join us on Second Saturday for the Bywater Art Walk from 6-8PM.
Collage As Art Movement
through 31 August 2025
Kolaj Institute has long maintained that collage is a community that operates like an art movement. In this exhibition, we offer a number of examples of how International Collage Artists come together, make art, and diffuse that art into the larger culture. The exhibition also explores how Kolaj Institute works to support that movement and the artists who participate in it. Among the work on view are panels from Special Agent Collage Collective’s exhibition, “colLABELage” (image); Frédéric Le ShoeShoe collages by Kolaj Institute Solo Artist-in-Residence Maria Turner; a collaborative scanograph made by artists from the Poetry & Collage Residency; selections from the Kolaj Institute folios, Authoritarian Regime Survival Guide and Frankenstein: 21st Century; an assemblage sculpture by Amite, Louisiana artist Julie Glass; a selection of art curated by Carol Lynch from the Collage Class at People Program NOLA, a non-profit organization that fosters lifelong learning and creativity in a vibrant community of seniors. Each of these exhibits is a starting point to explore how the International Collage Community operates as a 21st century art movement, a subject that Kolaj Institute will explore more deeply in the coming years. LEARN MORE
RECENT TITLES
NEW PUBLICATION
Frankenstein
This new version of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s classic 19th century novel Frankenstein; or, the Modern Prometheus features seventy-six illustrations by International Collage Artists who delved into the novel’s rich narrative and visual potential and created thought-provoking artworks that reflect the essence of Frankenstein in a 21st century context.
NEW PUBLICATION
Magic in the Modern World
Taking a broad view of magic and drawing from multiple histories, the book, Magic in the Modern World by Ric Kasini Kadour, proposes a way to think about magic in the 21st century, what it means to communities, and how it negotiates itself in systems of power. Generously illustrated, the book features the artwork of fifteen collage artists and dozens of historical images. The book asks, What role can artists play in nurturing and supporting magic traditions?
CURRENT ISSUES
Kolaj #41
Since 2011, Kolaj Magazine has documented, reported on, and explored the amazing artists who make up the international collage community. Inside Kolaj #41, you will learn about a collage series that unpacks a painful history, collaged seed packets, an exploration of Louisiana’s forgotten women, a review of a book on the history of collage, the reissue of a book about collage on screen, a curated selection from Kolaj Institute’s collection of collage, collage at the intersection of art and community history, a two-story collage in Miami, and artist portfolios. Our goal with every issue is that Kolaj Magazine is essential reading for anyone interested in the role of contemporary collage in art, culture, and society.
CURRENT ISSUE
PoetryXCollage: Volume 7
PoetryXCollage is a printed journal of artwork and writing which operates at the intersection of poetry and collage. We are interested in found poetry, blackout poetry, collage poems, haikus, centos, response collages, response poems, word scrambles, concrete poetry, scatter collage poems, and other poems and artwork that inhabit this world.
Each issue presents six movements of work by artists and curators. Page spreads are meant to be free zones of thinking where the contributor has chosen all elements of the layout: font, image place, composition, etc.
Artist Development at Kolaj Institute
At Kolaj Institute, our philosophy is that if we bring artists together, explore ideas and concepts, share knowledge, we can stretch and develop as artists. When we bring that knowledge and skill into our communities, we raise the standing of collage and contribute to the civic discourse. Kolaj Institute’s Artist Development Program is a collection of three core workshops for self-motivated artists, at any stage in their career, who want to develop and expand their collage-based artist practice and work towards professional goals, particularly in the areas of exhibitions and publishing.
Collage Publishing Workshop
In this four-week workshop, artists will turn a body of work or a project into a zine, art catalog, monograph, or book. We will explore different models of publishing and types of book projects. We will walk through the steps and support one another as we create publishing projects and prepare to put them out into the world. Participants will present and receive feedback on page spreads. Presentations will speak to issues around copyright and appropriation, getting the book printed, and launching and marketing the book.
Curating Collage Workshop
Curating is a vital part of art’s function: a curator creates a bridge between artwork and audience. For artists, this process can be confusing and mysterious. The goal of the Curating Collage Workshop is to equip artists with the tools to curate their own work, to work with curators, and build exhibitions that connect with diverse audiences.
Collage in Practice Workshop
Intended as a clinic for working artists at any level, participants in this workshop will explore how they go about making art and putting it out into the world. Participants will finish the workshop with a deeper understanding of their practice; a strong statement of practice that can be used to communicate with curators, editors, and art professionals; a portfolio of consistent artwork (or a plan to make one); and tools for growing or developing their practice.
EVENTS
Kolaj Institute in New OrleansKolaj Institute Gallery is an exhibition gallery, residency center, artist studio, library and archive. Located at 2374 Saint Claude Avenue, Suite 230, at the corner with St. Roch Avenue. Kolaj Institute also manifests in other locations and art institutions around New Orleans with the intent to activate community centered around collage.
ABOUT KOLAJ INSTITUTE
The mission of Kolaj Institute is to support artists, curators, and writers who seek to study, document, & disseminate ideas that deepen our understanding of collage as a medium, a genre, a community, and a 21st century movement. We operate a number of initiatives meant to bring together community, investigate critical issues, and raise collage’s standing in the art world.
Kolaj Institute works in partnership with Kolaj Magazine to communicate, market, promote, publish, and distribute the work of the Institute. Kolaj Institute is the recipient of Kolaj Magazine‘s archives and collections.
Kolaj Institute is decentralized and works in partnership with a number of art venues and other organizations around the world to manifest its programs.
What’s New at Kolaj Magazine
CALL TO ARTISTS Collage in Practice Workshop A four-week, virtual/online workshop with Kolaj InstituteNext Session: Sundays, 20 July-10 August 2025, 2-4PM EDT Submissions are considered on a rolling basis. The… [...]
PUBLICATION ANNOUNCEMENT Book & Folio: Authoritarian Regime Survival Guide by Martin Mycielski, illustrated & interpreted by contemporary collage artists Kolaj Institute’s Politics in Collage Project is a series of residencies,… [...]
AT KOLAJ FEST NEW ORLEANS 2025 Dinosaurs on the Moon: Stories from the World of Collage Cafe Istanbul in the New Orleans Healing Center2372 Saint Claude Avenue, New Orleans, Louisiana… [...]
COLLAGE ON VIEW Pluri-identiats/KRAK at the Museum of the University of Alicante in San Vicente del Raspeig, Spain28 March-13 July 2025 The 4th Pluri-Identitats Visual Arts Contest is an initiative… [...]
COLLAGE ON VIEW Nathan Stromberg: recollection / re-collection at Hopkins Center for the Arts in Hopkins, Minnesota, USA22 May-25 June 2025 Nathan Stromberg navigates and comments on the historical space… [...]