Ed Fella: Collage
Opens Saturday, August 22, at the gallery in Vermont
In 2022, graphic designer and artist Ed Fella sent me an unusual gift: two collages cut from the back of a discarded thrift-store painting. Nine more followed, each built from fragments of the same canvas—patched, worn, and repurposed into a series of small, quietly abstract landscapes. Fella titled the project “Glenn’s Vermont,” after my paintings and gallery aesthetic that had inspired it.
This exhibition presents the complete series for the first time: eleven collages made from cut, salvaged canvas by one of graphic design’s most influential and least categorizable figures. Born in Detroit in 1938, Fella spent three decades as a commercial artist before reinventing himself at forty-seven as a designer whose collages, flyers, and hand-lettered posters helped move the field from Modernism toward Postmodernism. He taught at CalArts from 1987 until his retirement in 2013, and his work is held in the collections of MoMA, the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, and LACMA, among others.
Works in the Exhibition
No. 1
No. 2
No. 3
No. 4
No. 5
No. 6
No. 7
No. 8
No. 9
No. 10
No. 11
All works by Edward Fella
2022
Cut oil-on-canvas fragments, collaged on paper
Dimensions in inches, height precedes width
1 6⅝ x 6⅝, Private Collection
2 7 x 6, Private Collection
3 6¼ x 6⅝
4 7 x 8⅛
5 6⅜ x 8⅛
6 6 x 6
7 6⅜ x 5⅞
8 6⅛ x 7⅞
9 4¾ x 5¾
10 5½ x 6⅞
11 4¾ x 4¾
Frames: 14¼ x 12¼, aluminum silver finish
Inquire about availability and shipping.
The exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue featuring an essay alongside full reproductions of all eleven works.
Available at the gallery in Vermont and at our Bookstore.