Collage and mixed media artist, Kareem Rizk, is from Ferntree Gully, Victoria, Australia. Since his shift of focus from graphic design to fine art and illustration in 2006 and his pursuit of developing his style, Rizk has been cutting and pasting his way towards a unique and contemporary style of collage and mixed media art that has earned him international recognition – as well as continued success working with numerous galleries, fine art publishers and creative companies all around the world.Collecting mostly old magazines and books but also scraps from torn billboards and street posters, discarded tickets, postcards, brochures and catalogues, Rizk has been sorting through op shops, flea markets, garage sales, antique stores and city streets around the world to find the images and ephemera that have found their way into his very nostalgic and weathered collage and mixed media works.

Working mediums include collage, acrylic, oil pastel, pencil, solvent transfers and acrylic transfers. The work is highly textured and often multi-layered with a nostalgic and weathered quality. Rizk’s works can often be vibrant with colour, while others display a very refined or minimal palette. Working methods also extend to digital collage with a very gritty and realistic display of texture and layering. The digital work began as an experiment in blurring the line between handmade collage and digital collage.

Exhibitions include solo shows and group shows in Melbourne, Sydney, Byron Bay, Brisbane, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Washington DC, Miami, Vancouver, London, Berlin, Copenhagen, West Cork (Ireland), Krems (Austria), Stockholm, Zurich, Barcelona, Madrid and Milan. Rizk’s work has been published in numerous art magazines and books and his work is held in private collections worldwide.

Give us the rundown on how you fell in love
with mixed media and collage art.

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I think it started just after high school while doing a 12 month creative folio building course and then continued to grow throughout uni. Even though I was educated as a graphic designer, we were strongly encouraged at Monash to explore and utilise a lot of fine art mediums and techniques. Having been exposed to a lot of hands-on methods and also studying art history as a compulsory part of the course, it definitely had a strong influence on the kinds of work and art that inspired me. While at uni I had also been referred to the work of Eduardo Recife by a friend and I loved it. When I came across his work again a couple of years later, I was more inspired than ever. It was the spontaneity in his handmade work and his affinity for texture, ephemera and typography that provided the fuel for me to start creating some of my first collages.

Tell us about the piece ‘Crave’.
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It’s a handmade collage on paper. Like a lot of my work, I didn’t set out to voice a message or opinion with this piece. I’m also very rarely consciously trying to tell a story. A narrative often evolves as the work is being made and it is very rarely defined or confined in any specific terms. This way, many different stories can be read into the work by many different viewers.

I think the main image contains a strong sense of attitude and almost assertiveness in the posture. It’s provocative, maybe a little confrontational and a tad aggressive. The word, crave, happened to be laying amongst the scraps of paper on the table and I immediately thought it was quite fitting. All kinds of connotations could be read into this image. Some of them I think are quite obvious, while others might be a little more subdued. Either way, I think it’s true of celebrity that so much about a person can be right in your face, while at the same time so much can be hidden.

Do you prefer handmade to digital?
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Definitely handmade. The majority of my work is handmade. There’s something undeniably more human, natural and therapeutic about it. There’s a unique sense of authenticity when using original images cut straight out of old magazines. I also love getting my hands dirty with glue or paint.
Is there more of a connection to the work that you’ve sourced the imagery for as opposed to trawling the net for pictures?
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For me, there’s definitely a greater connection to the work because I’ve had to physically search for the imagery. I’ve travelled a lot in the last 5 years to many different parts of the world. Finding the imagery or stumbling across it has been a story in itself. I’ve been on the look-out for imagery and ephemera almost everywhere I’ve travelled.

How do you create the handmade pieces and where do you find most of your imagery? Can you take us through your process.
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I find most of my imagery in op shops, flea markets, garage sales and antique shops. On a couple of occasions I’ve bought bundles of old magazines on eBay.

I work primarily on 3 different surfaces – paper, wood and canvas. The works on paper are literally just cutting and pasting paper onto paper and sometimes involves measuring and aligning certain elements. I often scratch or scrape certain areas to emphasise the weathered quality.

The works on wood and canvas require a lot more preparation. I make my own cradled Birch panels. I then often cover the panel or canvas with paper strips or folded paper (sometimes coffee stained) which creates a random tiled pattern as a background. Sometimes certain areas or pieces of paper stand out as focus points because of tonal differences. I often use these areas to place colour or extra texture e.g. paragraphs of text or torn paper.

I generally start with a main image and work around it. But sometimes I build up a background first and then find a fitting image. I very rarely sketch compositions. Only on a handful of occasions have I drafted a layout for bigger pieces. I sometime do a mock-up in Photoshop. The general layout often becomes apparent only after I’ve laid down the background and played around with the orientation of the panel or canvas.

Shapes and lines can also start to appear almost like a loose grid. The distribution of weight can also become apparent in particular areas on the working surface and so a piece will often be flipped sideways or upside down and a new direction for the piece will suddenly become apparent.

Like most of the images, elements and mediums that make their way onto the working surface, scattered bits of typography are usually scratched or scraped to create a weathered or distressed texture – further emphasising a notion of history or weathering.

I often introduce coloured geometric shapes to establish further dynamism and structure as well as introducing a point of hierarchy in relation to other elements on the working surface. This method is also applied in the form of acrylic paint, oil pastel and pencil in creating blocks and shapes of colour.

Interview by Aaron Craig