In my earlier article, Chance Aesthetics in Art, I explored how randomness, unpredictability and external forces can become helpful creative tools rather than obstacles. Chance techniques question traditional control and authorial intent, shifts attention from outcome to process, and opens the work to collaboration with chaos and happy accidents. I also provided links to historical and contemporary examples such as Surrealist automatism and Dada strategies, all of which demonstrate how chance can expand creative thinking and visual language. That article from May 2025 can be read here.
Building on that foundation, I have recently been researching how this process could be applied to Collage. Collage is uniquely suited to chance because it already deals in fragments, interruptions and reassembly. When randomness is introduced deliberately, collage becomes less about composing an image and more about discovering one.
One of the most direct ways chance enters collage is through the handling of materials themselves. Instead of carefully selecting images or papers to fit a preconceived idea, I often allow randomness to guide the initial selection and placement. This approach has clear historical roots in the work of Jean Arp, who famously dropped torn pieces of paper onto a surface and fixed them where they landed. The resulting compositions removed personal control and allowed gravity and accident to shape form. More on this can be found here.
In practical terms, this might mean tearing paper without looking, scattering fragments across a surface, or responding only to the relationships that emerge by chance. The unexpected juxtapositions that result often suggest meanings or tensions I would never consciously design. This approach aligns closely with Dada ideas of chance creation, where collage and photomontage were used to undermine logic, politics and artistic convention. An overview of this history is available via MoMA’s archive here.
Some collage techniques were specifically invented to disrupt intentional composition. Cubomania is a method where an image is cut into a grid and then reassembled randomly, ignoring the original order entirely. This process fractures meaning and produces strange visual rhythms that feel both familiar and alien. It is a reminder that chance does not destroy meaning but reshapes it. Further information on Cubomania can be found here.
Chance also enters collage through physical actions that allow materials to behave unpredictably. Froissage, which involves crumpling paper to generate random creases and textures, transforms flat images into landscapes of accidental lines. Décollage, on the other hand, introduces chance through removal rather than addition, tearing away layers to reveal unexpected images beneath. Both techniques embrace destruction as a generative force and and shape the final work. More on froissage can be read here and on décollage here.
What interests me is how chance can exist within systems that still involve choice and intention. By setting simple rules and then allowing outcomes to unfold independently, chance becomes structured rather than chaotic. This might involve limiting decisions, using random number generators, setting minimal colour palletes, or introducing arbitrary rules that determine placement, removal or layering. Research into experimental chance aesthetics often highlights this balance between control and unpredictability, which I find relevant to collage practice. A broader discussion of this balance can be found here.
These ideas also extend naturally into digital collage. Algorithmic processes can rearrange images, slice compositions, or generate infinite variations from a fixed set of materials. While this approach may appear technical, it echoes the same core principle of relinquishing control and allowing systems to generate form. Current research into computational collage explores how randomness and optimisation coexist in digital composition. An example of this research can be found here.
Practical Studio Exercise Working with Chance in Collage
When I want to actively introduce chance into my collage practice, I begin by setting up a simple framework and then stepping back. The aim of this exercise is not to produce a resolved image but to experience how meaning can emerge when control is partially surrendered. I start by gathering a range of source materials without editing for content. This might include magazine pages, old drawings, discarded prints, packaging, photocopies, monoprints or fragments from previous failed works (of which I have a lot:). I limit myself to what is immediately available in ‘my box of bits’ in the workshop rather than searching for specific imagery. This initial restriction is important as it establishes the first boundary within which chance can operate.
Next, I alter the materials in a way that removes careful decision-making. I tear or cut the papers without measuring, often folding the sheets first and cutting through multiple layers at once. Sometimes I crumple a selection of pieces and then unfold them, allowing the creases to become an active visual element. At this stage I avoid sorting or categorising the fragments. For the composition, I place my open workbook or sheet of paper as a working surface and drop the fragments onto it from a height to give me a starting position. I resist the urge to adjust their placement immediately. Instead, I observe the accidental relationships that form between shapes, textures and images. Only after this pause do I make minimal interventions, fixing pieces in place where they have landed or removing just one or two elements that disrupt the overall tension too strongly. Throughout this excercise piece I work fast without too much hesitation.
To extend the role of chance further, I introduce a simple rule system. I might decide that every third piece picked up must be glued down regardless of its position, or that I can only rotate elements a half turn clockwise. Once the collage is fixed, I stop working. I do not attempt to resolve the image or clarify its meaning. Instead, I leave the piece for at least twenty-four hours. When I return, I approach it as if it were made by someone else, noting where energy, rhythm or narrative has appeared without my conscious intent. Finally I photograph the work and reflect on it briefly sometimes recording it in a instagram post which I use as a diary of work. These observations can feed directly into later, more intentional pieces. These techniques can also be used to help one in breaking creative blocks and opening up other avenues of creative thought.
I am grateful to Sally Hirst whos marvelous courses I took awhile ago on Collage and Composition, Sally includes some elements of chance based composition and design in these. She is based in the UK and and runs online courses throughout the year check here for more information Sally is also on Instagram @sallyhirst_courses
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