Helen Adam : The Collages of Helen Adam

Helen Adam always had her camera with her. The first picture I have of hers is from a Halloween Party with Ebbe Borregaard, Joe Dunn, and me in costume. She was famous for the strange phenomena her brownie camera permitted—swirls of light and water spouts rising up out of ponds next to Robert Duncan. After I returned from Japan in 1964, I found my old friend, painter and Zen student Bill McNeill, was making a movie starring Helen—Daydream of Darkness. Scenes were dramatic, overlooking the ocean, crashing waves, swirling capes in front of moody cypress. 1963-64 was a time of heightened social activity, and Helen took lots of pictures of her poet and artist friends, many of which were in her show at Buzz Gallery. Her photos were a great gift of the moment. — Joanne Kyger  The seamless collages of Helen Adam seem to defy their own construction. The collaged images are so deftly woven together that we often do not at first see the eerie combinations half hidden in what appears to be a nor