Rebecca Sira Studio

temporary collage

Temporary collage arrangement of a used tea bag, a strip of weathered bark, torn blue paper, a wood block with small blue paper squares, a burl-like brown form, and a knotted stick, laid out on cardboard.

I live in the forest, and I’m always picking up moss, sticks, rocks, lichen, fallen bark. In 2024 I started arranging them into temporary collages – nothing glued, just composition, color, and texture worked out and then disassembled. I’d love to be more accomplished at collage, and this was a way to experiment without committing to anything permanent.

This practice led directly to three assemblages I made for Oregon City Art Commission’s 6×6 show in June 2025 – a body of work that’s since sold. Read more here.

I’m still working with temporary collages. I don’t know yet what they’ll become, but they matter because this is the type of work that informs what shows up later.

A hand holding a dried holly leaf with a hole and spiked edges, in mottled tan and dark brown.
A cluster of pale green lichen and moss resting on a wooden rail, with grass blurred in the background.
A hand holding an open paper wasp nest, showing its fibrous gray-brown structure.
Temporary collage arrangement of a found tree branch across a wood block, a torn coral-pink paper shape, an orange paper strip, and a scrap of white washi paper marked with black ink, on cardboard.
Temporary collage arrangement of a dried leaf, a used tea bag, a strip of weathered bark, and torn white paper, with two small dark seed pods, on cardboard.
Temporary collage arrangement of a dandelion seed head, a strip of pale green paper, quartz crystal fragments, a scrap of lichen, green paper, and a small puffball mushroom, on cardboard.
Temporary collage arrangement of a blackened wooden skewer nestled in a piece of bark, a strip of ink-marked washi paper, small turquoise robin egg fragments, cut magazine pieces, and a piece of pinecone, on cardboard.
A dandelion seed head resting in the mouth of a small glass jar filled with quartz crystal fragments, beside a strip of red-and-white striped paper.
Temporary collage arrangement of a lichen-covered bark topped with a dried poppy seed pod, a smooth, flat grey stone, a second small poppy pod, torn and stained tea bag paper, and strips of orange paper, on cardboard.