montage

montage , the art and technique of motion-picture editing in which contrasting shots or sequences are used to effect emotional or intellectual responses. It was developed creatively after 1925 by the Russian Sergei Eisenstein ; since that time montage has become an increasingly complex and inventive way of extending the imaginative possibilities of film art. In still photography a composite picture, made by combining several prints, or parts of prints, and then rephotographing them as a whole, is often called a montage or a photomontage.

Bibliography: See M. Teitelbaum, Montage and Modern Life, 1919-1942 (1992).

montage (French: ‘mounting’). A pictorial technique in which a number of cut-out illustrations, or fragments of them, are arranged together and mounted on a suitable background; the term also refers to the picture so created. Ready-made images alone are used and they are generally chosen for their subject and message; in both these respects montage can be distinguished from collage, in which materials of varied kinds can be used, often primarily with an interest in their decorative qualities. Montage is now associated particularly with advertising, but it has also been used by artists. Photomontage is montage using photographic images only. In cinematic usage, the term ‘montage’ refers to the assembling of separate pieces of film into a sequence or superimposed image.