Midwest Collage Society: March 2026

Wednesday, March 11, 2026

World Collage Day is coming up!

World Collage Day, Saturday May 9th, 2026 What are you going to collage that day?

Sunday, March 1, 2026

March 1st Meeting, Recap for our presenter Laura Smetara

Laura Smetara what our presenter today,

Laura has had some real life experiences that have inspired her stories and Illustrations for her books.

Amazing book a story about her grandfather and son.

Shared about the place of her family and birth place

The real work before it goes in to a book.

Laura's sharing how she make the papers for her work, very simple but the technique carries through all her books makes them so recognizable.

We where allowed to use some of her stencils and papers to create collage cards. It was fun to create these too. Looking forward to more books from Laura.

Monthly Meetings

MCS generally meets on the first Sunday of each month (excluding January and July), from 12:30 to 3:00 PM in Darien, IL. Since many members live well beyond this area, the MCS uses its newsletter, group website, and regular e-mail communication to provide all members with timely information about planned exhibits and program content. Annual dues are twenty dollars ($20.00). Members also pay nominal fees for meeting workshops and exhibit entries. Membership dues are payable in April of each year.

Meetings are held at the Darien Municipal Center, 1710 Plainfield Road, Darien, IL.

Members

The MCS has over fifty members from Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin. Most members reside in the Chicago area. All members are professional artists who exhibit regularly in urban and suburban galleries. Many exhibit in other states, and a few exhibit internationally. The backgrounds of our members are varied, and range from those with graduate training in the fine arts to the self-taught. Many work in fields outside of the art-related professions. The diverse experience of our members is one of the Midwest Collage Society's greatest assets, and has contributed to our growth.

Ode to Collage Artists

We walk around always looking down,
Searching for things to pick up off the ground.
Leaves and paper or bits of string,
We can use just about anything.
While others may watch us and shake their head,
We just cram the stuff in our pockets and forge on ahead.
Home we go can't wait to start, what would we do if we didn't love Art?
We empty our pockets to peruse all our treasures, amazed this junk gives us great pleasures.
We crumple and tear, we sand and we paint, And we can't forget the glues and paste.
Amazed with the things we can create from someone else waste.
When were done some will say we just made it look old, But when we look upon it, All we see is Gold!

by Debbie Wojnarowski

Pages

Wednesday, March 11, 2026

World Collage Day is coming up!

Sunday, March 1, 2026

March 1st Meeting, Recap for our presenter Laura Smetara

History