Bricolage is the act of creating with what is immediately available—working intuitively with materials at hand rather than relying on traditional or prescribed art supplies. For me, bricolage has never been a learned concept or academic framework; it has always been instinctive. Long before I ever attached a name to it, I was already creating art by gathering discarded objects, overlooked materials, and everyday remnants and allowing them to guide the work.
©Michel Keck. Take It Or Leave It - Assemblage 2014.
My journey into bricolage began in 2003, when my eBay career first started. I spent countless weekends attending auctions and often came home with box lots of junk—sometimes even free—that no one else wanted. In one of those box lots were several old cigar boxes. Those cigar boxes became the foundation of my earliest assemblage work. I began creating small shadow box scenes inside them and selling them on eBay.
Most of my friends and family didn’t understand the work, but that never mattered to me. I was drawn to storytelling and humor, and many of those cigar box pieces carried a playful, subversive edge. One piece featured old Bambi toys and books arranged to look as though Bambi had been smoking—and was, in fact, responsible for the forest fire. I loved the idea of telling layered narratives using only the materials I already had, without purchasing traditional art supplies.
A few years after creating those cigar box assemblages, I became aware of something that genuinely troubled me: the amount of trash I was personally responsible for generating in my studio. Empty paint bottles, worn-out brushes, paint-covered clothing, studio rags, discarded plastic—it all added up quickly. That realization pushed my work deeper into the philosophy of bricolage and responsibility.
I began a series of works where I saved all of the trash created in my studio. Nothing was excluded—used paintbrushes, empty paint bottles, paint-splattered clothing, discarded materials, even dirty studio rags. These objects were mounted directly onto canvas and painted over in strict monotone palettes: white, black, silver, red. The materials remained visible but unified, transformed.
As I created these works, I shared the process and meaning behind them with my eBay followers and collectors in real time. Some immediately understood the message, and those pieces sold as soon as they were completed. I loved that I could literally make art from trash—art that served a dual purpose: creating something visually compelling while actively reducing the plastic and material footprint I was responsible for as an artist. That series permanently shaped how I think about materials, waste, and sustainability in my work.
Collage in my practice is the act of layering fragments—visual, emotional, and material—into a unified whole. Collage has always been one of the spaces where I feel the most freedom in my studio.
My abstract paintings and circle drawings are created almost entirely through instinct. They flow without hesitation or interruption. Those works feel like a direct translation of intuition onto the surface—immediate, fluid, and emotionally driven.
Collage, while still intuitive, asks something different of me. It is not a single, uninterrupted flow. It requires listening and responding—placing, moving, removing, and replacing elements again and again until the relationships between materials finally feel resolved. The intuition is present, but it works through patience and adjustment rather than speed. This distinction is what keeps me returning to collage and assemblage as a way to slow down and engage in conversation with the materials.
Assemblage is where bricolage and collage fully move into physical space. Assemblage allows materials to exist as themselves—weathered, rusted, aged, imperfect—while becoming something entirely new through placement, balance, and relationship.
In 2007, while exhibiting at the New York Art Expo, I was speaking with a man in my booth about one of my works, Hard Knock Life - a mixed media assemblage painting. He studied the piece for a long time and then told me that my work made him think of Robert Rauschenberg. I remember feeling a bit embarrassed when I told him I didn’t know who that was. I had never studied art history, never gone to art school, and knew very little about well-known or famous artists. I was simply making work instinctively, without any formal reference points.
©Michel Keck. Hard Knock Life - Assemblage 2007.
He smiled and assured me it was a compliment and encouraged me to look up Rauschenberg’s assemblage work. When I did, I was amazed—not because I felt validated by comparison, but because I recognized a shared instinct: the desire to take objects most people would never consider art and allow them to speak in new ways.
It wasn’t until the end of 2013 that I began creating large-scale found object assemblages. Over the years, my husband and I had collected weathered wood, rusted metal, old tools, and unusual antique objects during hikes and travels. We weren’t collecting with a plan—we were simply drawn to the history and character embedded in those materials.
©Michel Keck. Title: Just Because - Bricolage | Assemblage - 2013
At the time, we were renovating an old farmhouse, and I wanted artwork that fit a vintage industrial yet antique farmhouse aesthetic. When I couldn’t find anything that felt right, I decided to make the pieces myself. That decision marked the beginning of my large-scale assemblage work.
©Michel Keck. Title: Like It Or Not - 2014
As I returned more fully to assemblage, I noticed myself repeatedly forming works in the shape of the cross and the shape of the heart—two forms that appear again and again in my work regardless of medium. These shapes are never forced; they emerge naturally through the materials themselves.
BRICOLAGE ART | ©Michel Keck Cross Art Assemblages from Found & Discarded Objects
The cross, for me, embodies both darkness and light. It represents pain, sacrifice, and suffering, but also hope, redemption, and love. My abstract paintings have long been described as both dark and light simultaneously, and I see that same duality embodied in the cross. After my sister passed away, the symbol took on even deeper meaning—a quiet reassurance and a sign of continued presence.
@Michel Keck Bricolage Cross Art Assemblage
@Michel Keck Bricolage #022201 Cross Art Assemblage
@Michel Keck Bricolage #022204 Cross Art Assemblage
The heart has become equally central to my assemblage work. For many years, I have studied the research of the HeartMath Institute and have been deeply interested in the concept of heart–brain coherence—the idea that the heart is not merely a mechanical organ, but a powerful center of intelligence that communicates directly with the brain. Heart–brain coherence suggests that when the heart and mind are in alignment, we experience greater clarity, emotional balance, and a deeper sense of connection.
©Michel Keck | Bricolage Heart Art | #2 Cross Art Assemblage
That understanding naturally finds its way into my art. My heart assemblages are not decorative symbols; they represent coherence, integration, and emotional truth. Using found objects to build hearts allows me to visually express the idea that wholeness can emerge from fragments—and that meaning often arises from what has been discarded.
©Michel Keck | Bricolage Heart Art | #3 Cross Art Assemblage
Assemblage is where I feel most fully immersed as an artist. Many of my pieces sit for days, months, and sometimes even years—some cross and heart assemblages included—waiting patiently for the exact object that completes them. I do not rush that moment. Objects are placed, moved, removed, and replaced until the work quietly resolves itself. The piece tells me when it is finished.
Today, I find myself drawn again to bricolage, collage, and assemblage as both creative refuge and artistic clarity. The three-dimensional nature of found object assemblage art allows my work to exist beyond replication. It is rooted in specific materials, specific histories, and specific moments in time.
At its core, my work is about transformation—turning discarded materials into meaning, waste into beauty, and fragments into stories. Whether shaped as a cross or a heart, or an abstract structure, each piece is created slowly, intuitively, and with intention—an honest reflection of how I see the world and how I choose to build within it.
You can view my available original bricolage art by category at the links below..
