Louis Armstrong (the late, great Satchmo to his fans) was an American jazz trumpet player and one of the most popular vocalists of all time. His gravelly voice and skillful scat have reverberated deeply throughout American culture, profoundly influencing the world of popular music.
Not so widely known is that Armstrong was an avid collage artist as well as an incredibly talented musician. The story goes that Louis first created a series of collages on paper & put then up on the walls of his den, but his wife, Lucille Armstrong, objected to the artwork. Lucky for us, this didn’t slow Louis down any.
collage by Louis Armstrong
collage by Louis Armstrong
Armstrong always traveled with a large steamer trunk full of reel-to-reel tapes & equipment, and it was on these tape cases that Louis began his new collection of collage art. At the time of his death, Armstrong had decorated some five-hundred reel-to-reel tape cases, creating over a thousand collages on the fronts and backs of the boxes.
collages by Louis Armstrong
collages by Louis Armstrong
The collages have been compiled for your pleasure in Satchmo: The Wonderful Life and Art of Louis Armstrong, a biography in the form of an art book by artist & Armstrong fan Steven Brower. “It tells the story of Armstrong’s life through his writings, scrapbooks, and artworks, many of which have never been published before.” “A true American original, he was prolific in coining colorful expressions that entered the lexicon; he wrote long, colorful prose pieces about his experiences; and he made hundreds of collages using marvelous photographs that capture archetypal scenes in the life of a jazz musician. Everything he did was an extension of his artistry.”
collages by Louis Armstrong
The collages feature photos of Louis Armstrong and his friends & fans, newspaper clippings & reviews, telegrams, and cuttings from packaging of Swiss Kriss herbal laxatives which appear quite frequently in the pieces.
collage by Louis Armstrong
collage by Louis Armstrong
collage by Louis Artmstrong
Rarely do the tape case collages hold any indication as to the music within. The works are undated and untitled, but seem to have began sometime in the early 1950s. A letter written by Armstrong in 1953 states, “Well, you know, my hobbie (one of them anyway) is using a lot of scotch tape… My hobbie is to pick out the different things during what I read and piece them together and [make] a little story of my own.”
collage by Louis Armstrong
collage by Louis Armstrong
collage by Louis Armstrong
The full collection of collages now reside in the Louis Armstrong Archives at Queens College in Flushing, New York. They illustrate how this incredibly talented artist could use his irrepressible creativity to not only entertain millions, but to entertain and amuse himself privately as well.
collage by Louis Armstrong
collage by Louis Armstrong
collage by Louis Armstrong
SATCHMO: The Wonderful Life and Art of Louis Armstrong by Steven Brower
Armstrong created his final collage after returning from the hospital following a serious illness in June of 1971. He died on July 6th of that same year, at the age of 69.
“Some where along the line I became a collector of odd and useless things. I am drawn to objects that have a past, a story to tell, like pieces of rusty metal along a roadside, a seashell corroded by the salt water, or a discarded letter found in a musty box. I can spend hours conjuring the stories of unknown people in discarded photographs on antique stores shelves. These are my chosen materials, my inspiration for creating. Many years ago I fell in love with folk art, Mexican in particular, and then later cajun/vodou altars and folk art. One of the most important components in folk art is the use of ‘junk’ or “garbage” as a medium for creating. In that process the artist raises the status of the mundane, ordinary, throw away object from mundane to divine. I strive to follow in that tradition. So I gathered up my strange collection of things, my ecclectic spiritual leanings, my love of folk art, a sprinkle of feminism, and a dash of alchemy to create the pieces you see here. I hope you enjoy.” – Clarissa Callesen, creator of strange & wonderful things.
