My favourite collage book is Corey Moortgat’s The Art of Personal Imagery. It’s partly because I share her approach of using personal images and symbolism in collage; but also because I love her soft style and techniques. So the book is often found lying around my home and this morning my son picked it up. He flicked through a couple of pages then said: “I want to make this.”

The ‘this’ in question was an arch-shaped corrugated cardboard collage of one of Corey’s sons. I very rarely use arches in my pieces—it is just not something that resonates with me—but my son was captivated. Now, he is 4 1/2, so his collage technique is rudimentary, to say the least. But he got out his scissors, tape and glue, grabbed some of my cast-off scraps, coloured pencils and markers and started to work.

The end result is not something that would ever make it into Corey’s book (or any book, for that matter), but I can see the inspiration behind it. Nicco was, of course, very proud of his effort. Then he asked me who had written the book that had got him started, and I said it was a lady called Corey. And he said: “Well, then, this is for Corey, please send it to her.”

So Corey, if you happen to read this post, this is for you.