Magazine Photo Collage

Magazine Photo Collage (MPC)
Reference: Landgarten, H.B. (1993). Magazine Photo Collage. New York, NY: Brunner Mazel Publishers.
Purpose: This assessment is designed to unveil conflicts, defense mechanisms, and styles of functioning.
Ages: No age limit is noted.
Materials: 4 sheets 16x20” paper, 2 boxes of precut images: one of people; one of miscellaneous items; liquid glue, glue stick, scissors, pencil, pen, black marker
Tips for creating image boxes: Use only images, no words. Avoid neatness of everything being cut out. Have a wide variety of images. It is ideal to have many images reflect the culture of the client. Look for realistic images (not too glam). Include male and female figures of all ages. Look for figures indicating movement. Try to find images representing all economic levels. Include single people, families, groups, and dyads. Have some images with eyes or ears cut away. Try to find black and white and color photos. In the miscellaneous box provide a large variety of images. The boxes may be “stacked” with images that may be relevant to person’s treatment goals, i.e. alcohol, suicide, abusive images, fire setting, divorce.
Administration: The administration of the MPC involves a four task protocol. It is helpful have all of the materials laying out when the client enters.
Task I: Task I has the least instructions, thus establishing few boundaries. “Look through the box of miscellaneous items and pick out pictures that catch your attention and paste them on the picture (liquid glue). Write directly on the page anything that you associate with the items.”
Task II. Second sheet of paper: “Pick out 4, 5, or 6 pictures of people, and glue (glue stick) them on the page. Write or tell me what you imagine each person is thinking and saying.”
Task III. Pick out 4, 5, or 6 images from the people or misc. box that stand for something good or something bad and glue (glue stick) them down. Write or tell me about these items.”
Task IV. Pick out only 1 picture from the people box and glue (glue stick) it down. Write down or tell me what is happening to that person. Do you think the situation will change? If yes, then find a picture that illustrates the change, or to tell you what will make it change.
Interpretation:
Task I considerations: How did person handle the images? Were the images torn, trimmed, or left in original state before being pasted down? How was the glue handled? How was the placement (carefully, haphazardly)? What was the overall gist of pictorial content (theme or scattered)? Was there a specific message that appeared?
Task II considerations: Is the person able to follow directions? How does the client perceive trust? The number of pictures selected is important only if the next two tasks produce the same response.
Task III considerations: What does the person consider good or bad? Does the person use only people? Only things? Combination?
Task IV considerations: Does the person’s outlook seem positive or negative? How do he/she problem solve?
Strengths: Client exercises control over the assessment because he/she selects his/her own collage images. This assessment is less-threatening than many other assessments because no artistic ability is needed. This assessment is not culturally bound if the image boxes come from a diverse selection of magazines. MPC can be a meaningful tool in revealing problem areas.
Limitations: The MPC is not empirically based. Also, the MPC requires a great amount of preparation time in order to keep image boxes appropriately stocked with diverse images. It would also be difficult to complete this assessment in one session.
Content, pictorial elements and thematic evidence,
Reflection: Despite this assessment appearing to be a lot of prep-work for the evaluator, it seems great. I understand why we didn’t try it in class, but I would be interested in experiencing this assessment as the artist. It is very creative and allows the artist a lot of control, even though it is highly structured. I anticipate using this assessment as an art therapist, and have already started on my image boxes!