The process of transformation that has suffered the technique of collage from his invention at the beginning of the twentieth century until the present time, reflecting changes in sensitivity which has gone modern culture. Max Ernst was before anyone who got to introduce a new poetic scene, causing the eruption of the irrational in some small spaces where their elaborate visual metamorphosis. The principle of collage based on the famous formula Lautréamont that the surrealists took to the letter: beautiful as the chance encounter of an umbrella and a sewing machine on a dissection table. That phrase was added later, another, this time from the poet Pierre Reverdy: the more distant and fair in two rough realities, the image will be stronger: will have more power and greater emotional reality poetic. The surreal, continuing through those dictates, looked at old slides illustrated books all sorts of realities, which created its own universe incoherent to the same extent that dreams are too.

But other developments added new dimensions to the expressive possibilities of collage. The modern world has experienced a technological breakthrough in all respects, surreal imagery relegating to second place, as a product of thinking based on past beliefs airtight. Gone are therefore the figures taken from catalogs of the nineteenth century, to give way to images entresacadas of advertising, which brings together all the various aspects of modernity. The Pop Art helped to give a decisive step in that direction with its icons representing the consumerism of cutting capitalist societies. Artists using collage as Richard Hamilton and Ron Herron, then were able to mount their own scenarios with all the paraphernalia of modern life thanks to Pop. On the other hand and despite the flow of postmodern thought, a new mythology was seizing the collective imagination, replacing the dreamlike images of surrealism with effigies from the comics.

So how can we witness in the sample collages in the Art Center / South Florida Gallery content of the profound change that has experienced this technique. The nineteen painters exposed some of Florida, others in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and London, give us some alternatives ranging from recycling cliches advertising until putting together imaginary spaces appear where new mythical figures. Under these procedures various artists have been able to offer their own visions of contemporary reality. From the white structures Bari Ziperstein write in their mansions, disrupting order them, the human figures until Paul Butler with its aura of mystery; Since version punk Gean Moreno to the juxtaposition of various elements taken from contemporary magazines (Vogue , Playboy, etc.). Ahearn, via compositions close to onirismo of Tami Demarre and Rakel Bernie, a world unexpected opens its doors before our eyes. That world they reproduce much more exuberant that the surreal, and larger, no longer responds to the process of integration that a Max Ernst sought with his compositions, but rather to another fragmentation characteristic of the flow of postmodern thought. What they have in common with their ancestors, however surreal is that despite everything, the attempt to set up a contemporary mythology is present in almost all the works exhibited. Based on this principle, the exhibition places us within a proliferation of pictorial metaphors that make us feel participants in the chaotic diversity of realities that we must face every day, both in the streets, with their constant comings and goings of people, as in our homes, in front of a television set. We may or may not like this world, but it is impossible to ignore. And that fact is reflected in the current exhibition, with works that clash with our eyes to the impact that characterizes violent culture

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'Reverie + Revolt, Contemporary Collage', Artcenter, South Florida Gallery, 800 Lincoln Road, Miami Beach. 'Reverie + Revolt, Contemporary Collage', Artcenter, South Florida Gallery, 800 Lincoln Road, Miami. Until November 18. The exhibition is organized by Jane Hart. From Thursday to Sunday, 11 a.m. a 11 p.m. 11 p.m. Information call (305) 538-7887.