assemblage

assemblage. Term describing works of art made from fragments of natural or preformed materials, such as household debris. It was coined in 1953 by Jean Dubuffet, who originally applied it to some of his own two-dimensional works (‘assemblages d'empreintes') made by cutting and pasting together sheets of paper; these have been seen as extensions of the Cubist collage. However, Dubuffet soon extended the meaning of the word ‘assemblage’ to cover small sculptures he made from such materials as sponge and scraps of wood. Subsequently some critics have maintained that the term should apply only to three-dimensional found material and not to collage, but it is not usually employed with any precision and has been used to embrace photomontage at one extreme and room environments at the other. Allan Kaprow's book Assemblage, Environments & Happenings (1966) attempted to clarify the terminology, but the vague usage continues.

In its broadest sense, assemblage has its roots in the sculptural experiments of Picasso, in Dada (particularly the work of Schwitters), and in Surrealism (many of whose exponents made objects from diverse materials), but it was not until the 1950s that a vogue for this kind of work began. The term itself gained wide currency with an exhibition called ‘The Art of Assemblage’ at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, in 1961. The exhibits included ready-mades by Marcel Duchamp, boxed constructions by Joseph Cornell, ‘sacking’ pictures by Burri, compressed automobile bodies by César, tableaux by Kienholz, collages by a wide range of artists, sculptures by Nevelson and Tinguely, and much else besides. In the introduction to the catalogue, the exhibition organizer, William C. Seitz, said that ‘The current wave of assemblage … marks a change from a subjective, fluidly abstract art towards a revised association with the environment. The method of juxtaposition is an appropriate vehicle for feelings of disenchantment with the slick international idiom that loosely articulated abstraction has tended to become, and the social values that this situation reflects.’ During the 1960s assemblage was much used by Pop artists and it has continued to be a favoured technique with many sculptors.