The term 'assemblage' was coined by Jean Dubuffet in 1953, but the
practice had already been explored since the early 20th century by
artists like Picasso and Marcel Duchamp.
Pablo Picasso is considered one of the pioneers of the technique, when
in 1912 he glued a piece of wallpaper onto a painting, sparking the idea
of incorporating three-dimensional elements into an artistic
composition.
Assemblage is not the same as collage: while collage uses only two-
dimensional elements, assemblage incorporates real, three-
dimensional objects into the artwork.
Dadaism was the conceptual birthplace of assemblage, rejecting
academic art norms and embracing absurdity, chance, and social
critique of the industrial world.
Assemblage works often carry a strong symbolic and poetic weight, as
the objects used have their own histories and evoke personal or
collective memories.
The Surrealist movement also embraced assemblage as a way to
represent the unconscious, human desires, and the hidden worlds of
the mind.
Many assemblage artists work with recycled or discarded materials,
creating art from what society throws away — a powerful metaphor for
transformation and recontextualization.