Cecil Touchon

“The hunt for materials is a big part of a collage artist’s activity and these materials, to a great degree, determine the nature of the artist’s work and in my case, I welcome the stimulus that becomes the impetus for new methods of construction and new compositional ideas. Most often, in years past, I have focused on book sized papers found in second hand shops, flea markets and antique stores from Paris, Texas to Paris France. Recently, however, I have taken an interest in street posters and roadside billboards and the large typographic shapes that they contain in a quest to move from the small intimate scale I have been accustomed to toward a comparatively larger scale of work that might allow me to work on canvas and panel supports without losing the attention to detail. I think of these works as a sort of visual or concrete poetry albeit a nonobjective one whose interest is not in being tied to literary meaning but a meaning of a purely visual nature.”

ARTIST BIO

Cecil Touchon Born 1956 Austin, Texas is a contemporary American collage artist, painter, published poet and theorist living in Pagosa Springs, Colorado. Touchon’s serene and abstract works fuse drawing, painting and collage. From his Fusion series to poetry and sound collages, Touchon derives much of his imagery from his fascination with the differences between how the modernist ideal has evolved in Mexico and the United States. Comprising more than 1,750 works to-date, his work has explored a variety of styles throughout the years.

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Seemingly random and abstract, Touchon’s thoughtful collages liberate the viewer from everyday meanings so that they are left to consider the visual impact of his work. He enjoys removing things from their original context, rendering a work ambiguous in its meaning. Though they appear spontaneous, each work has a keen sense of balance and color. There is a logical and well thought-out harmony inherent in his collage work. Because Touchon’s environment triggers his visual vocabulary, one feels a sense of the local rhythm when considering a body of his work.

Although we are bombarded daily with volumes of fragmented and disconnected information, Touchon points to an underlying harmony at work. Through the seemingly haphazard, yet controlled medium of collage, Touchon is effectively able to express this view of the world. His current artistic movement is towards simplicity. He is governed by a desire to be strait forward and to refine his expression to an essence that is visually concrete.

Understanding Touchon’s work also asks that one explore the tension between the human sense of perfection and machine perfection. The artists of the Neo-Plastic or De Stijl movement who aimed for a machine-like perfection of purity compositionally inspire Touchon’s work. However, Touchon’s work reintroduces the human element, the element of spirit. He constructs his collage poetry from the volumes of email correspondence he is always engaged in and alters bits of audio he pulls from the Internet to create his sound collages.

Touchon continues to explore the realm of collage from his studio in Pagosa Springs, CO. He’s works are included in several important private and public collections including HBO, IBM, J.P. Morgan Bank, Citibank, United Airlines, American Airlines and Neiman Marcus. Touchon’s works are included in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL, the Tate Modern, London, UK, The Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, CA, the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, the Fogg Museum of Art Archive, Cambridge, MA, Archivo Francesco Conz, Verona Italy, and the Glasgow School of Art Library, UK.

SELECTED COLLECTIONS

MOMA – New York, NY
MOMA Library Manhattan, New York, NY
Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library-Yale University- New Haven, Conn.
Fogg Museum of Art Archive- Cambridge, Mass.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art Research Library, Los Angeles, CA
The Getty Research Institute – Los Angeles, CA
Modern Realism, San Francisco, CA
Chicago Art Institute – Chicago, Ill
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Ill
Iowa State University – Fluxus Collection – Ames, IA‎
ATCA Special Collections, Iowa State University, Iowa City, Iowa
Avant Writing Collection – Rare Books & Manuscripts Library – at Ohio State University
Ohio State University Libraries, Rare Books and Manuscript Libraries, Columbus, Ohio
Longview Museum and Art Center – Longview, Texas
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN
The Tate Modern – London, UK
Tate Britain (Archive), London, UK
Museum Fluxus + – Potsdam, Germany
Artpool Art Research Center, Budapest, Hungary
TAM Archive, Breda, Netherlands
Szuka Fabryke /Archive, Tielrode, Belgium
426 East Hyman Avenue, Aspen, Colorado 81611 www.forrefineart.com 3
Knud Pedersen Archive, Copenhagen, Denmark
E.O.N. Archive, Viareggio, Italy
Archivo Francesco Conz, Verona Italy
Sellem Archive of Experimental and Marginal Art, Lund, Sweden

CORPORATE COLLECTIONS

The Mansion at Turtle Creek – Dallas, Texas
Dannon Yogurt
Pace Managements
Quaker State Oil Company
HBO
IBM
UPS Atlanta Offices
American Airlines at DFW Airport
Delta Airlines
United Airlines at Denver International Airport
Longview Museum and Art Center
Craig Properties
Reader’s Digest
Hallmark Cards, Kansas City
Prudential Insurance Company, Prudential Plaza, Newark, NJ
Cargill Corporation, NM
J.P. Morgan Bank, (International Division), New York
Sanyo Corporation
Neiman-Marcus, New Jersey, Fort Worth & Florida
Swiss Banking Services
Fidelity Investments, Boston
First Boston
Trans Texas Investments
Southwest Bank
Citibank
Bank of Tokyo, New York
The Muse Hotel – New York City, New York
Mito Plaza Hotel – Kyoto, Japan
The Westin Hotel 292 5th Ave New York
American Express, NYC
Hampton Inn – Washington D.C.
Bellagio Hotel Las Vegas (2 black figures)
The Fairmount Hotel Washington D.C.
The Carlyle Hotel NYC
Metromedia Restaurant Group