With collage as her chosen medium, artist Andrea Bergen’s work is at once wildly energetic, colorfully vibrant, and not a little bit cautionary. Creating work from hundreds of pieces of handcut colored paper with a process she has been developing since 2014, Bergen says the opacity and saturation of the medium suits her artistic temperament better than paint. Frustrated by the drying time of acrylics and oils, Bergen does not “luxuriate in the painting process” like other artists—she wants to get the image out as quickly as possible.
“The collage process is endlessly additive and I enjoy the simplicity of the materials. I use only three things: scissors, colored paper, and gel medium as glue,” Bergen told 48hills.
Influenced by the Surrealism and Pop Art movements as well as street art and internet memes, Bergen’s work primarily imagines a post-apocalyptic world absent of humans, tableaus in which animals survive off the trash we’ve left behind in the wreckage. Her artworks often feature urban animals, such as raccoons and pigeons, because she feels they have had their environment the most drastically altered by human activity.
“My collages show these animals eating our discarded junk food and taking on human characteristics after we are gone,” she said.
The three-by-four-foot collage Head in the Clouds, Paws in the Trash, was inspired by the fairy tale “The Town Musicians of Bremen” written by the Brothers Grimm. But rather than showcasing the actual animals featured in the story, Bergen swaps them out for a raccoon, possum, rat, and pigeon. In this electric pastoral piece, animals operating on high-frequency survival mode are surrounded by our detritus—a juxtaposition, she says, that encapsulates her hope for a future in which animals will adapt to the human-altered environment.
In the piece The Good, The Bad, and The Buc-ees, Bergen juxtaposes our creature replacements with a backdrop of natural Southwestern beauty with reminders of how humans have basely and irreverently experienced it, represented by a litter of dirt bikes and ATVs, vending machines, and fast-food rest stop chains.
Bergen will tell you she has always had an affinity for animals and a sincere concern for their wellbeing. As a child, she and her mom would pick up stray dogs and cats from the side of the road. They frequently visited the Lindsay Wildlife Museum in Walnut Creek, an organization that promotes respect and responsibility for our co-existence with wildlife, rehabilitates injured birds of prey and other animals, and provides educational programming.
Some of Bergen’s favorite childhood books were by British artist-author Graeme Base, featuring lush illustrations of animals that she says inspire her “maximalist aesthetic taste” today. She is currently a big admirer of the watercolor artist Walton Ford.
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“At first glance, Ford’s large-scale landscapes appear to be scientific drawings for their detail and realistic portrayal of wildlife. But on further inspection, strange and cryptic narratives come into focus, often involving the human impact upon nature. The stories have inspired some of the themes I employ in my work,” she said.
Bergen’s collages began as simple landscapes depicting desolate places, like empty highways and abandoned roadside attractions. Later, narrative scenes of a post-apocalyptic animal wonderland began to emerge. The larger world of Bergen’s collages expanded again in 2018 with creations of papier-mâché sculptures to accompany the flat pieces, which she says was inspired by a visit to Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
“The artist-created, walk-through exhibits there completely immerse the viewer into themed stories. The feeling inside these places is otherworldly and magical. I would like to create this type of environment with my art, one that brings the audience into the work through installations. I am working towards creating a seamless environment in which one can be fully transported into an alternate reality,” she said.
Bergen was born in Oakland in 1989 and grew up in the East Bay. After completing a degree at California College of the Arts (BFA in Painting and Drawing, 2012), she began renting studio space in San Francisco and has had several spaces in the city over the past decade. She currently lives in San Francisco on the border between Mission-Dolores and Hayes Valley, with an art studio within walking distance of home. Bergen says she feels support from and tangible accessibility to the local arts community.
“There are so many talented artists in the Bay Area and there is room for everyone. Artist-run spaces are easily engaged with and provide opportunities to underrepresented creators. The artists here are not only passionate about their work but about helping their friends through financial support or by attending their shows. As financial pressures make it more difficult to be an artist in the Bay Area, this community support is crucial for survival,” Bergen said.
From her shared studio in the Mission District—a nondescript, converted garage beneath a Victorian house—Bergen occupies a corner of a white-walled room where a clutter of large tubs filled with myriad scraps, papier-mâché animal sculptures, and colorful junk food wrappers take up residence. On a folding worktable, Bergen arranges all of her papers by color to facilitate her process.
“When I am working on a collage, I will have the general idea sketched out onto a wood panel or sometimes mocked up in Photoshop. I use visual references for everything I create, often ‘Frankenstein-ing’ several images from the Internet together to achieve what I want,” she said.
Her process of collaging begins with pulling a piece of paper, cutting out a shape with scissors, then pasting it onto the panel surface with gel medium. This process is repeated until the collage feels complete, which is determined when the piece seems balanced and closed to any further intervention.
“This is usually just a feeling I get when looking at it and am not bothered by any empty space,” she said.
Though not professing to be a prognosticator of things to come, Bergen says that the increasingly bleak news regarding the outlook of climate change concerns her and ultimately drives her work. In these unsettling times, her dire depictions are likely to strike a chord in viewers of her potentially prophetic narratives.
“This work is my outlet for dealing with the dread that predictions and current disasters produce. As a coping mechanism, I create fantastical visions of an alternate reality in which everything turns out well—for the animals at least. The sense of playfulness and humor in my work is my antidote for hopelessness,” she said.
Bergen has been busy working on a new group of collages and papier-mâché sculptures for her current show Game Night with Kai Tse at San Francisco’s MAG Galleries, which runs through April 27. The new body of work is a continuation of Bergen’s exploration into animal/human relationships, with imagery specifically inspired by hunting trophies, circuses, and carnivals.
“I’m also addressing the uneasy feeling of living as a consumer in a capitalist system that is destroying the planet,” she added.
Bergen is also participating in two group shows in San Francisco this spring; The Birds and The Bees, from April 11-May 3 at Arc Gallery on Folsom Street and The Tenderloin Times at Geary Street’s Low Key Skate Shop from May 1–June 1. She is regularly represented at the Mission’s Drawing Room Annex.
Bergen says her art practice takes up the majority of her time, and she feels fortunate that she has the opportunity to dedicate so much of her life to it.
“Creating work is pretty much my world. When I’m not in the studio I like to take walks around the city, but I get bored and despondent if I’m away from my art for too long,” she said.
Though Bergen clearly contends with the heavier themes of consumption and climate change, what she ultimately wants is to make work that is fun to look at. Like submerging oneself in a Hidden Object game, the intricately labyrinthine detail is an important aspect of experiencing her work, and Bergen relishes people’s remarks on returning to a single piece repeatedly and discovering something new each time.
“The collage technique I use doesn’t always translate into photographs or prints but the most satisfying reaction is when the cut paper snaps into focus for a viewer and they are amazed that it isn’t a painting,” she said.
As viewers, we have our work cut out for us. Whether examining a single artwork or taking in a series of rhapsodically, yet disturbingly, prescient collages as a whole, Bergen’s point is well-taken. As her work continues to move forward in the Bay Area art scene, its colorfully psychedelic tone combined with provocative subject matter draws us in and makes us ponder the future of our world. Andrea Bergen’s cup is creatively full and overflowing. She encourages others with artistic urges to roll up their sleeves and get to it.
“Anyone can be an artist and everyone has the capability to create. It can be challenging to overcome the mental hurdle of fear of mistakes or messing up, but there is no such thing,” Bergen said. “The only thing worse than making bad art is making no art.”
For more information, visit her website andreabergen.com and on Instagram.
