Originals

FATHER NATURE original paper collage


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Size & Details

Size & Details

Large-scale collage portrait of Father Nature holding a Clark's Nutcracker bird with hawk feathers, raccoon skull, & scarab beetle accessories and beaded garb.

  • Medium: vintage papers on wood
  • Size: 69" H x 57" W (framed)
  • Frame: hand-built salvaged metal with acorn, leaf and scarab beetle accents
  • Hardware: ready to hang with D-ring hangers on back
Story

Story

Father Nature... holding his precious creatures and... singing the prayer that beetles sing beneath the soil. - Dolan Geiman

When the moon rises and illuminates the magnolia branch in the winter forest, Father Nature comes with icy breath to drape the bark in a glass case, covering it from disease. In the mid-summer heat, in a field of pigweed and poison oak, Mother Nature lifts the newborn fawn from the gnashing maw of the farmers combine and places her in a shady spot by the river, within sight of her birth mother. In an old oil painting above the hearth in some country abode, while the fox makes a mad dash over the fallen log, trailed behind by a dozen riders in red and their yelping foxhounds, it is Father Nature who places the burrow in front of the fox to make a hiding place. When the lightning strikes the mountain and lifts the spirits of three hundred stricken dragonflies from their mortal bodies, it is Mother Nature who takes them home and refills their bodies, and plants them in the clouds so that, with the next rainstorm, their souls can return to earth to dart above the racing river. The last thought that man will ever have will be a vision, a picture as if in a dream, the face of mother and father nature, holding their precious creatures and humming like a giant catfish, singing the prayer that beetles sing beneath the soil.

Process

Process

The first work in a series reflecting my thoughts on the fragility of nature, this large-scale work was created with thousands of vintage papers hand-cut into individual pieces and collaged to wood. Each and every square in the beadwork along his arms was hand-cut with scissors.

Learn more about the collage process.

process
Limited Series

Limited Series

Each work in Dolan Geiman’s portfolio is unique and hand-crafted. Works indicated with “limited series” are reiterations of a recurring theme or concept.

A Certificate of Authenticity is available upon request.

  • Each piece in a limited series is created with an inimitable collection of found materials: no two are exactly alike, although they may look similar at a glance.
  • Details, colors, specific materials, typography and frame will differ from work to work.

Learn More

Dolan Geiman Paper Collages

Dolan's signature paper collage artwork celebrates America's West and Southwest. Color, composition, and detail come to life in hand-cut vintage materials, many salvaged in Dolan's cross-country travels.

Creating the original collage starts with a wood panel. Dolan pulls vintage sheet music from his vast collection and applies these to the wood, first with glue, then with a top layer of whitewash paint. In many prints, this background layer of sheet music peeks through.

Next, Dolan draws the outline for the original collage in graphite atop the sheet music.

Dolan returns to his extensive trove of collected papers – think magazines, antique textbooks, handwritten letters salvaged from abandoned farmsteads - and begins pulling the ideal colors for the piece. He cuts each piece of material by hand and carefully layers into the artwork. These collages are carefully crafted from thousands of small papers: no two are exactly alike.

Dolan's paper collages are finished in a handmade frame constructed from salvaged metal or a modern, minimal wood or metal frame.