Since 2005, Tomaselli has developed a body of works on paper that transform the front page of The New York Times with gouache and collage. The surreal compositions are ruminations on the absurdity of news cycles and provide the artist with a space to respond to a variety of issues – from regional anecdotes to global crises. As Tomaselli states, “I think that maybe
the Times collages are quietly political, in that I can riff on anything I want, while the horrors of the world become the background buzz. Maybe I’m saying that the world may be going to hell, but I still keep painting.”

The New York Times series began with Tomaselli’s fascination with the front page image (March 16, 2005) of Bernie Ebbers, exWorldCom CEO and his wife leaving a Manhattan courtroom upon his conviction of a multibillion-dollar fraud. In this body of work, Tomaselli scans the front page and reprints facsimiles onto archival watercolor paper: “I’m a collagist who cobbles
together work out of the artifacts of others. In doing so, I tap into the social collective while always keeping the personal at the center of this enterprise...I can cut them up or reprint them at will as many times as I want. This allows me a lot of freedom. It’s ironic that the digital tools I now rely on are also responsible for the distress of print media.”