Collages

Personal Archaeology: Collages, 1990–2001

Between 1990 and 2001, Joyce created an expansive body of work she calls Personal Archaeology — more than 1,000 collages that layer fragments of daily life into visual excavations of memory. This presentation offers a focused selection of 14–20 works, each combining postage stamps, fabric, pattern, and drawing into dense, tactile compositions.

Rather than preserving the past as nostalgia, these collages reframe the overlooked and the ordinary as cultural artifacts. They invite viewers to consider how fragments — a swatch of cloth, a canceled stamp, a hand-drawn line — can carry the weight of history. In Joyce’s hands, the personal becomes a shared archaeology of time.

From the GA series of Grand Archaeology collages, a larger size format.

The “Personal Archaeologies” series of collages have been ongoing since 1990. Early versions were in response to great stamps collected from participation in “MAIL ART”, ongoing since graduate school in 1980. Work with interior designers left the studio cluttered with bits of fabrics and scraps of paper that seemed to beg for a creative resolution. Parts of monoprints, older paper paintings that didn’t quite “Work” and general special pieces of paper from travel and various interests made their way into the fabric like woven surfaces of the collages as I cleared a path through the studio desk top. These collages are like a history and intended to be mood pieces.

Before the PA and GA, series, there were CS, collage square and CV, collage vertical.

The earliest collages like this one used a glue gun for glue, later replaced with clear caulking.

Personal Archaeology: Collages, 1990–2001 presents a rare glimpse into Joyce’s decade-long exploration of memory and material. From a vast archive of more than 1,000 works, this focused selection of 14–20 collages highlights the artist’s distinctive use of postage stamps, fabric, pattern, and drawing. Each piece functions as a fragment of cultural excavation, transforming the overlooked and the ordinary into layered visual histories. Far from nostalgic, Joyce’s collages probe the ways in which fragments accrue meaning, offering a tactile counterpoint to the sleek surfaces of the digital age. The exhibition invites viewers to consider how the personal, when reframed, becomes a shared archaeology of time.