Abel Adames / DarkSideOf Collages
Artist Abel Adames has been creating beautiful and original works of art inspired by Progressive rock, and heavy metal artists. His detailed pieces are collages which contain images from a specific theme and or artist. For example, his work "Thought of Dreams" is a collage of the Dream Theater covers, the Greatest Gig in the Sky, a collage of Pink Floyd artwork, and Fly By Night, a RUSH collage.
Below are some examples.
Check out his site HTTP://DARKSIDEOFCOLLAGES.BLOGSPOT.COM, where you can view his works and even download them and use as your background. 12 x 18 high quality prints are also available to purchase.
I hooked up with Abel for an interview.
LOUDTRAX: What Inspires you to create these collages?
ABEL: Well, the idea first hit me as one day I saw a band collage that someone did or some sort of collage and I thought “ Gee, I can do this but different and better ” hehe! Then I created my first collage “favorite 70’s Concept albums”. I posted it on a prog website (progarchives.com) and I received many positive comments, praises and subjections. I am guessing from the success of that first collage I was encouraged and inspired to continue.
Also, one of the major inspirations is my love and passion for the music that these bands had created. They have a very special place in my life since I was 13 years old. It had gained big part in my heart that I don’t think I can’t live without it. I had cried listening to Pink Floyd’s The Wall, Dark side Of the Moon and Genesis’s A trick Of The Tail, to mention just a few. If you catch me walking on the street you will see me constancy doing air guitar and air drums of songs by RUSH.
So I wanted to pay tribute to these bands that I had love with these collages.
Now these days the idea of creating “New Art” is an always inspiring. I had received many complements and people saying that my collages are unique and like nothing they ever seen before. That is a great inspiration.
LOUDTRAX: How often do you create a piece?
ABEL: I would love to make collages as often as possible, at least one every other month, but because of lack of time, I can’t really. My 9-5:30 job won’t allow it. I am married man, a single parent raising a 13 year old girl. Which, I love by the way. So, between all of that, I manage to make these collages. It usually takes from one month to 3 months, when I can. There’re had been many sleepless nights.
I made 6 collages this year compared with only 3 last year.
LOUDTRAX: I noticed there is an exhibition for your work in India. Are there other exhibitions? When, Where?
ABEL: So far this is the first time that my collages are going to be exhibited in a gallery and I am hoping that this isn’t the last. Let’s see how it goes. My collages have been featured in many blogs and websites. I am very honored to have these collages exhibit at this gallery. They had exhibited artwork by 2 of my major influences and inspirations such as Salvador Dali and Picasso. I love and admire Dali’s work.
LOUDTRAX: Have you ever been approached by artists/musicians to create artwork for there albums?
ABEL: I had done an album cover for a band Solder Theory (http://www.myspace.com/soldertheory)
They are a prog band and will have their debut album next year. So hopefully there will be more in the near future.
LOUDTRAX: What artists would you most like to collaborate with and create a custom piece for?
ABEL: I don’t have a specific band that I would like to work for. As long isn’t for a Rap project it will be fine! I guess an established band that has plenty of material that I can work on would be great one. I would love to get approached by progressive rock labels or one the Progressive rock festival (Progfest, Nearfest) promoters and design some poster for them, that would be awesome. Prog is my thing but it doesn’t have to be prog all the time.
LOUDTRAX: Do you ever get hassled by artists or record labels who do not want you to create art using their images? How do you feel about that?
ABEL: So far I hadn’t been. Lucky me! I have sent emails to the bands I had done collages for. Some bands had given me the Ok and even praises for the collages, but some have never responded. I see it as a free promotion and exposure to rock fans that have never heard of these bands. For Instance, when I created the collage about Gentle Giant, many of the fans of the collages never heard of them. The Idea is to spread the word about prog music with colorful artwork. I am just hoping that I won’t get hassled because I am not making these collages for money and I am not hired to make them. I do ask for a donation to the visitor of my blog and I sell copies of the collages here and there, but it isn’t that I am making thousands of dollars. Otherwise I would quit my 9 to 5 job.
LOUDTRAX: How many images do you typically use in each piece? Are they all from album covers, or other sources as well?
ABEL: It depends on the band that I am creating the collage for. If the band has many albums and I can find tons of high quality jpegs the better. I had used over 100 images on my very last collage, the one dedicated to progressive Metal. Most are the album covers, promo pictures and even my own personal pictures of the band. On some collages as a background image I used my own which was taken by me. I do that so it can be a more personal collage. For example, in the Porcupine Tree collage the tree and Sky image are my own photos, also, I created some part of the clouds and background. Another, example, in the Genesis collage, the whole sky and clouds and all lighting effects were all done in Photoshop. They aren’t real pictures... I always challenge myself when I decide to create a new collage and I always try hard to make it different from all of them, but in the same style.
Thank you.
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