✂️Upcoming Exhibition - Come to Me, Here Beside the River - New Orleans Jazz Museum, 400 Esplanade, New Orleans, LA 70116, USA.✂️

⚡️✂️Upcoming Exhibition: Come to Me, Here Beside the River✂️⚡️
⏰When: Tuesday the 8th - 22nd of September 2026
📍Where: NEW ORLEANS JAZZ MUSEUM,
400 Esplanade,
New Orleans,
LA 70116,
USA.

I am delighted be taking part in the forthcoming “Come to me, here beside the River” Exhibition to be held during the NOLA Riverfest at the New Orleans Jazz Museum and organised by the Kolaj Institute. In Celtic Mythology many of our main rivers were considered to be Goddesses, full of power and mystery, and fonts of folklore in their own right. It was interesting to me the to consider the Mississippi in a similar vein.

About the Exhibition:
“Come to me, here beside the River” brings together nine International Collage Artists, each of whom offers a unique take on the Mississippi River as a dynamic force of culture. The exhibition will take place on the iron fence of the U.S. Mint, home of the New Orleans Jazz Museum.

Participating Artists include:
Anthony D Kelly (Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland), LaVonna Varnado Brown (New Orleans, Louisiana, USA), Marta Janik (Warsaw, Poland), Lilya Chavaga (Brussels, Belgium), Matthew Hendricks (Cape Town, South Africa), Allison Spence (Tallahassee, Florida, USA), Seth Ter Haar (New Orleans, Louisiana, USA), Jeanna Penn (Oakland, California, USA) Ric Kasini Kadour (New Orleans, Louisiana, USA & Montreal, Quebec, Canada).

This exhibition is also part of the Kolaj Institutes overarching “The River Bends, So Must We” project.

”The River Bends, So Must We” Project:
“The River Bends and So Must We” is a project of Kolaj Institute that reflects on the Mississippi River as a dynamic force of culture. In 2026 and 2027, we will bring together artists from the International Collage Community to make artwork that imagines and speaks to what lessons the River can teach us about our own humanity. We will consider the history of the River in New Orleans from primordial times, pre-Columbian civilization, and to the present moment. We will examine how the River is an economic force, a tool of power, a natural wonder, and source of magic. We will take up Maya Angelou’s (1928–2014) invitation in her poem, “On the Pulse of Morning”, and “Speak to humankind today. Come to me, here beside the River.”

For more about the Kolaj Institute and “The River Bends, So Must We” project CLICK HERE.

For more about the New Orleans Jazz Museum CLICK HERE.

✂️Upcoming Exhibition - Big Orange Monster: An Emergency Collage Exhibition at Kolaj Institute Gallery in New Orleans, 2372 Saint Claude Avenue, Suite 260,Louisiana, USA ✂️

✂️⚡️Upcoming Exhibition - Big Orange Monster: An Emergency Collage Exhibition⚡️✂️
Opening: Wednesday September 10th
Opening Reception: Second Saturday, September 13th 2025, 6-8PM (CDT)
Running until: Saturday, October 25th, 2025.

At:
The Kolaj Institute Gallery,
2372 Saint Claude Avenue, Suite 260,
New Orleans,
LA  70117,
USA.

If you follow my work then you know that I have a special interest in monsters, what they represent, how they can make us laugh, how they cause us fear, and what they can teach us about ourselves. So I am delighted to have dispatched some dastardly creatures to take part in this monstrous exhibition at the Kolaj Institute over the next two months.

Here is a little from the organizers:
“The world is run by monsters and you have to deal with them. Some of them run countries, some of them run banks, some of them run news corporations.” –Ken Livingstone

You mix fear (yellow) and anger (red) and you get a Big Orange Monster. What’s the emergency? There are a lot of Big Orange Monsters on the loose. Monsters only have power if you are afraid of them. So let’s create a space where we can slay our fear of Big Orange Monsters. Art helps us exorcise our demons. Monsters can be glorious and wonderful or horrible and evil. Let’s not cast aside the good Big Orange Monsters because some other Big Orange Monsters are well…unpleasant.

Curated by: Ric Kasini Kadour

Other Events During the Exhibition: 
Collage the Tarot Workshops: September 10th & October 8th 2025 7-9 PM (CDT)
Collage Artist Meet-Up: Tuesday, September 30th , 6-8PM (CDT)
Second Saturday: 11 October 2025, 6-8PM (CDT)

For more about this exhibition, events and the work of the Kolaj Institute CLICK HERE.
If you dare to enter the hallowed Rare Monster Archives CLICK HERE .

✂️⚡️Upcoming Roundtable Discussion - Writer's Corner at Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025⚡️✂️

⚡️Upcoming Roundtable Discussion- Writer’s Corner at Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025⚡️
Friday, 3.15- 4.45pm (CDT), June 27th, 2025,
At: New Orleans Healing Center Suite 250,
2372 St Claude Ave,
New Orleans, LA 70117,
United States.

In addition to the aforementioned symposium, I am delighted to be hosting this roundtable discussion with the great Kirk Read and Erica Trabold.
This informal workshop is a space for those with a writing practice to connect with one another.

Author and collagist Kirk Read (Portland, Oregon, USA) will kick off the space with an exercise centered on visual and word practices. He wrote, “We will explore how these language and visual practices inform each other, how they compete and argue and agree in our minds and hands. Using generative writing experiments, we will create titles, move past stuck places and animate our personal writing. We will use fast collage paste-up to breathe life into our writing practice and quickly tap into the weird parts of our creative landscape.”

In the past year, Erica Trabold (Lynchburg, Virginia, USA) has been using prompts to take her practice to unexpected places. “One collage prompt even resulted in an entire series I wouldn’t have other wise made,” she wrote. “As a writing professor, I assign and use prompts constantly—but I had never explored them in the visual art space.” Trabold will share what she’s learned.

Anthony D Kelly (Castlebar, Co. Mayo, Ireland) often uses the cross activation of collage practices and literary mediums to spur on new moments of inspiration and to deepen the experience of both for an audience. He believes in both words and images as seeds which can give rise to each other and that by “changing channels” between these modes of expression we can nurture unexpected and exciting new works. Kelly will invite participants to consider this concept and lead a short playful visualization exercise along these lines to free up the imaginative process.

For more about the Roundtable Discussions at Kolaj Fest 2025 CLICK HERE.

To learn more about about the wondrous Kolaj Fest and to download the festival events program
CLICK HERE.

For more from the Kolaj Institute and Magazine CLICK HERE.

Image: “A Dream of the Awakening Spring” (2020) - Digital Collage - Anthony D Kelly

✂️Upcoming Symposium - Curiosity, Wonder, Joy, & Portals at Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025✂️

⚡️Upcoming Symposium- Curiosity, Wonder, Joy, & Portals at Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025⚡️
Saturday, 2-3pm (CDT), June 28th, 2025,
At: Cafe Istanbul, 2372 St Claude Ave,
Room 252, New Orleans, LA 70117,
United States.

I am really honored to be presenting research and work on my upcoming Lexicon of Wonder project at Kolaj Fest 2025 as part of a symposium on Curiosity, Joy, Wonder and Portals alongside the amazing Breasia Hayes, Savannah Greene & C.Joi Sanchez.

I have been formulating the Lexicon of Wonder project over the last number of years and it is soon to be completed and released in the form of exhibitions and a publication. The first iteration of the Lexicon of Wonder exhibition will take place at Áras Inis Gluaire later this Summer with details coming soon.

Check out a note below from the organizers about the Symposium and my part in it:

”With its roots and history in the Surreal, collage is a well-built path to exercise curiosity. What happens if I put these two things together? Collage’s ability to bridge time and geography makes it a vehicle to explore new realms. During the Symposium at Kolaj Fest New Orleans, we will hear from Anthony D Kelly, Breasia Hayes, Savannah Green, and C. Joi Sanchez, each who are engaged in projects that explore wonder and joy and how life experiences take one down creative paths.

Anthony D Kelly is an artist, writer, and integrative psychotherapist from Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland. “At the beating heart of my art practice are both wonder and play. Collage is a way for me to connect with myself, my community and the world around me,” wrote the artist. “I often hold a concept, word or idea in mind until an image coalesces and presents itself internally. I then sit and begin to sift through materials both digital and analogue for something that resonates.” Kelly will present his project, “Lexicon of Wonder”. He wrote, “Wonder and Awe are complex emotions arising in response to experiences of profound beauty, connection, natural phenomena, or through bearing witness to the incredible capacities, courage or talents of other human beings. They can also arise at times of great personal crisis or fear such as witnessing the raw power of nature at a time of natural disaster.” Kelly will speak about project origins, his ongoing research into the emotional states of wonder and awe, the role poetry plays in the project, and his plans for an exhibition and publication.”

For more about the Symposium itself CLICK HERE.

To learn more about about the wondrous Kolaj Fest and to download the festival events program
CLICK HERE.

For more from the Kolaj Institute and Magazine CLICK HERE.

Image: “Communications Bananatron” (detail) by Anthony D Kelly
21″x9″; Digital Collage; 2024.