Drawings and Digressions

Doodles, cont.

2011-12-08T10:55:00.000-08:00

Poor Twirlita.
All she wants to do is finish her dance:

Doodles by the great Lynda Barry

Lynda Barry is of course a cartoonist, and as such, her basic tools are pen and paper. There's a brilliance about the way in which she uses drawing to convey humor -- from the willowy legs of the dancer to the motion lines and stars throughout. There are 40 examples of this on the page, and all of theme, either taken as a continuous narrative or viewed individually, are hilarious.

Disorderly Digression

2011-12-01T17:09:00.000-08:00

Occupy Wall Street is this generation's very own Kent State. As the demonstrations heat up in cities across the country, here are just a few of the signs captured by photographers on the ground. They're an important record of the times, a combination of political cartoon and performance art, coaxing factual knowledge and interpretive skills from viewers. And there's the drawing technique - sometimes slick, but mostly raw and emotional, with shards of cardboard boxes as support for the varied illustrative styles.

I like the one with the little girl in the tiara. She seems to be caught up in the festivity of it all, but it's doubtful she really understands the context in which her poster appears. I think it's an example of grammar school expressionism, juxtaposed with the expressions of an angry proletariat, which makes it kinda sweet.

Grime Writing

2011-11-23T10:13:00.000-08:00

Street artist MooseBenjamin Curtis was once arrested for creating graffiti on a South Londonpublic wall. Which is ironic, because Moose wasn’t creating marks on the wall –he was subtracting the dirt and grime deposited there over time by airpollution. The result, as you can see in the above “drawing” at the BroadwayTunnel in San Francisco, is a more beautific public space, created with scrubbrushes, rags, cleaning fluid and sometimes a high-pressure hose. Check outthese other examples of his negative space art:

The one below says “Thank You For Not Breeding.”

Subway Drawings on an iPhone

2011-11-19T06:00:00.000-08:00

A friend of mine posted these amazing drawings on Facebook. The artist is Dug Winningham, a sound technician who was born with an ability to draw what he sees. He used an iPhone app called Brushes to create these drawings. The program allows for intense detail via its zoom capability, and the drawings show a much more sophisticated approach than what seems possible, given the diminutive nature of the tools. Each drawing is multilayered with color and line, produced with just a finger treading on the screen. It's interesting to see how artists' tools are evolving along with technology. We have literally at our fingertips the ability to create a project like this one, which involves more sophisticated technology than that which attempted to launch the Apollo 1 spacecraft.

Line, Pt. 10

2011-11-15T08:30:00.000-08:00

This amazing linocut by Marc Snyder demonstrates the importance and agility of line to produce meaning. Every detail is rendered either by the creation of line, or the complete excavation - the absence - of line.

How to Draw a Drowning

2011-11-12T13:04:00.001-08:00

"How To Draw A Drowning," 8"X3" intaglio by Marc Snyder, 2001

This schematic of a critical event is calmly rendered by artist and printmaster Marc Snyder, who runs the Fiji Island Mermaid Press. A visit to his website is strongly recommended.

Best Use of Graphical Representation of Landforms

2011-11-11T19:34:00.000-08:00

Drawing by Marc Snyder

About Narrative

2011-11-11T19:10:00.000-08:00

Have you seen this band? Of course not. Polish artist Jakub Julian Ziolkowski made it up to satisfy an insatiable craving for storytelling.

His work is a product of his imagination and presented in non-linear and disjointed narratives, grotesque figures fraught with death and decay, otherworldly forms, and obsessively created and rehashed imagery.

"I really like to create artificial, imaginary names and situations," says Ziolkowski. "I just invent them, which I think is more real. If something is completely imaginary, like a portrait without a name, it's surreal, but if you've got the names, you think, "Who is this Timothy Galoty? What's going on here?'"

More Bunnies

2010-02-25T11:17:00.000-08:00

Pencil on paper by Jedsada Tangtrakulwong

If Computers Did the Drawing For Us

2010-02-24T00:01:00.000-08:00

A list of perfect female statistics was fed into this artificial brain (the thing that looks like a vending machine in the corner) and the result was this drawing, titled "Miss Formula," 1964.

Drug Store Mannequin Digression

2010-02-23T00:01:00.000-08:00

Business has taken me out of town and away from the blogosphere for a few days. Until I return, here is a post of the coolest thing I have ever seen (discovered at a Long Beach, Calif. collectibles shop Feb. 20, 2010):

It is an Italian mannequin made of resin in the 1950s and used as a drug store display for bandages. This fellow stands under 5 feet tall, and has a small, perfectly round hole straddling his upper and lower lip -- I suspect it was to hold a resin cigarette that fell off at some point.

Today's Drawing

2010-02-18T00:01:00.000-08:00

Pencil, oil stick and turpentine on bristol, 11" X 14"

Line a la German Expressionism:

2010-02-17T00:01:00.000-08:00

Kathe Kollwitz, self portrait 1924, charcoal on paper

Anti-anti-art

2010-02-16T00:01:00.000-08:00

Anti-anti-art
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Anti-anti-art is a stance proposed by the Stuckists in their manifestos outlining their art. In it, they take a particularly strong position in opposition to what is known as "anti-art".
Stuckists claim that conceptual art is justified by the work of Marcel Duchamp, but that Duchamp's work is "anti-art by intent and effect". The Stuckists feel that "Duchamp's work was a protest against the stale, unthinking artistic establishment of his day", while "the great (but wholly unintentional) irony of postmodernism is that it is a direct equivalent of the conformist, unoriginal establishment that Duchamp attacked in the first place".

Line, Pt. 9

2010-02-15T00:01:00.000-08:00

Let's look at two things together that we have so far explored separately: line and doodles. The following three drawings were discovered at random on a notepad in the lunch room of the pencil factory where I sometimes do freelance graphic work:

Do these drawings tell a story? Are they maps of something? Are they somebody's daydream? Are they a continuous narrative? What can we tell from the line? Is it obvious the person who did these drawings was sourcing their imagination, or is there evidence of some reference material? Does the drawing use symbols honed in childhood to communicate information? Does it matter? Do you think these drawings are more interesting as mystery artifacts, or are you searching for their context to derive meaning? Submit your doodles to eglazner@gmail.com for future discussion.

Mystery Artifact

2010-02-14T00:01:00.000-08:00

I don't like the assumption that some people can draw and others can't. Anyone who can hold a pencil or a pen, or in some way create some sort of mark-making, can draw, just as anyone who can think can write. We are all artists and writers in that sense.

Witness the doodle or the tweet. Both of these are means of communicating in our culture, though the first is usually done in a semi-aware and private manner and the latter is designed to be a shout out to others. What they have in common is that they are both organic. They both indicate immediate process and execution and are windows into the doodler or tweeter's sensibilities. "Artists" are lauded for such behavior because of their specialness.

I found this doodle the other day and think it is worth sharing. Withhold judgment re: style or context, and it gains power as a mystery artifact:

Third Generation Pop Artist

2010-02-13T00:01:00.000-08:00

I don't like hairy men, terrorists, scatological humor or the devil, but I LOVE the drawings of William James Barminski:

11" X 17" colored pencil drawings mounted on wood, 2006

Herbert Baglione on the Emptiness of Chaos

2010-02-12T00:01:00.000-08:00

I Heart Snow

2010-02-11T00:01:00.000-08:00

In respect of snow, and to wish well those affected by "Snowmaggedon" this week, here is what it looks like in Inyo County, looking west:

Gouache on paper, 3.5 X 5 inches

Line, Pt. 8

2010-02-10T00:01:00.000-08:00

A storm system moved in to the Eastern Sierras today. By the time I was walking the dog this afternoon along the canal, the clouds were a dense purple and grey edged in silver, and the mountains behind them were thick and white with a vein of gold. Barren trees and brush receded from red to grey, until they became ghostly thickets of smoke. Where had I seen this before? I kept wondering. Then I remembered.

These are large drawings by Anthony Goicolea, in which he uses semi-opaque mylar overlays to soften and obscure his otherwise strident mark-making. I think I know now how he came upon this imagery.

Dessa Digression

2010-02-09T00:01:00.000-08:00

If there is a hip-hop equivalent to the street artist Swoon, it is Dessa. She just released the amazing CD "A Badly Broken Code," and is being made a momentary big deal of because she is a white female who raps. White females do a lot of shit, brother.

I like this recent tweet of hers almost as much as I like her lyricising:

"The fan in my laptop turned on and I earnestly believed the noise was coming from my head. Now somewhat alarmed by my lack of concern."

Line, Pt. 7

2010-02-08T07:22:00.000-08:00

Actual cat (left)
Line sketch of cat (above)

This is accomplished by ignoring the plaintive looks from the cat and focusing instead on its contours.

Line, Pt. 6

2010-02-07T00:01:00.000-08:00

What we see as line is actually edge:

We use line to interpret things, even though "lines" as we perceive them do not really exist in nature. This is a revelation when ordinary people decide to do the extraordinary and draw what they see. The result is actually an attempt to trace the edges of things. People who draw, if they stick with it, will begin to develop a quality of line that better describes those edges and how they reflect light, plunge into shadow, soften or corrupt contours, etc.

Line, Pt. 5

2010-02-06T00:01:00.000-08:00

The Swiss artist Paul Klee defined line as "a dot out for a walk."

Paul Klee,
"They're Biting," 1920,
drawing and oil
on paper,
31.1 x 23.5 cm.

Seriously, go get a dictionary and look up "line" (n.) as it applies to drawing. The definition doesn't begin to describe mark-making and its possible dimensions. Webster's New World College Dictionary, Fourth Edition, provides 36 definitions for line as a noun, but only one comes close: "...a very thin, threadlike mark; specif., a long, thin mark made by a pencil, pen, chalk, etc." Klee's definition is much more accurate.

Still more about line tomorrow...

Flying Thing

2010-02-05T00:01:00.000-08:00

Pencil and oil stick with turpentine on bristol.

Because I had one in my sketchbook.

Drawing Flies

2010-02-04T00:01:00.000-08:00

The origin of these drawings is almost unknown. They arrived this morning in my e-mailbox from a friend, who credits them only to her ADHD. I think they are utterly amazing.

Line, Pt. 4

2010-02-03T00:01:00.000-08:00

Detail of large drawing, oil and graphite on paper by Jenny Saville

More than any other element of a drawing, the quality of its line has the ability to simplify forms, distort perspective, add rhythm, define and emphasize shapes, focus the eye, deceive it, add spontaneity, create atmosphere, decorate and describe.

Line, Pt. 3

2010-02-02T00:01:00.000-08:00

In skiing, there is a concept called the "fall line" that is described as the natural line of descent between two points on a slope. If you have ever been out on a mountain with a slippery implement beneath you (skis or a snowboard or even one of those plastic discs,) the fall line is something you can actually feel. You want to throw yourself into your sight line with all your weight and just enjoy the ride.

To me, that is drawing. Finding the line is like surrendering to gravity. And once you find it, you have to commit to it, or suffer the consequences.

John Singer Sargent, "At the Forge," about 1911, charcoal on paper.

When you approach a representational drawing, whether or not you are using a live model, try to find the fall line and begin there. In the above example by Sargent, it is easy to see it -- it is the line that begins at the model's left wrist and travels down to his left hip.

Line Pt. 2:

2010-02-01T00:01:00.001-08:00

Line is probably most commonly understood in terms of contour, or, the outline of a shape. Most lessons in drawing start there. Students are told to take up their pencils, look at an object, and trace its outline in space onto a piece of paper. It's an adequate way to begin drawing. More than that, it's an excellent way to begin seeing.

My own first-year college attempt at drawing a live model in pencil.

Most of these first efforts are characterized by a quality of line that shows little confidence. My brother, a geologist, only took up drawing this year.

As he trains his hand to record what his eye sees, the quality of his line improves. It is beginning to lose that sketchiness that shows a lack of commitment. Check out the hair:

That hair is a turning point. It shows a bold leap forward in terms of commitment. You can see it in the line -- a continuous tangle and flow that no doubt reflects the shape and rhythm of the object my brother saw in drawing class. No self-consciousness about hairline or individual strands, just a gestural form.

Drawing the Line

2010-01-31T00:01:00.000-08:00

In middle school, when art class was still a viable part of the curriculum for kids, we followed along with a teacher as she drew upon a large pad of newsprint set on an easel. She clutched a black felt marker between her thumb and the palm of her hand at a unique angle -- not because she was demonstrating a secret way to draw, but because she had severe scoliosis that warped her body and twisted her fingers so that only one hand was usable while the other wrist came to rest on her hip. The image of this less-than-5-foot-tall, elderly and acerbic woman standing at the easel was spectacular and scary for me as a sixth grader.

When Mrs. Burton drew the weathered planks of a shack, the shingles on a roof or the bricks in a wall, I learned about the essence of a thing. It was, she told us, The Line that mattered, and we should never neglect it. I am certain she used source material, because what I did NOT learn in Mrs. Burton's class was how to conjure things to draw merely from my imagination. She taught us to see line everywhere. When Mrs. Burton drew the trunk of a tree and, even more thrillingly, its leaves, I also learned it was the absence of Line that revealed just as much visual information as its presence.

Lines, drawn with an Ebony pencil, jet black - extra smooth.

Process, Cont.

2010-01-30T00:01:00.000-08:00

Chicago artist Jeff London contributes this statement, by New Yorker cartoonist Harry Bliss, to our discussion on different approaches to drawing. I would label this "content over representation:

"What I try to convey in my panels is a human truth. Rarely do I begin with a caption or idea. I begin by drawing something -- anything, say, a couple watching TV. Maybe there's a dog on the floor and the couple is arguing -- pretty common, right? Next, I try to imagine a narrative which led up to this 'frame.' Perhaps, even a narrative beyond what I've drawn. What are these two people fighting about? Politics? Love? Sex? Children? A Mother-in-law? What is the motivation for their actions? In short, what's the story behind the drawing? Investigating the characters both before the drawn panel and after will fuel potential for dialogue. One or both of these narratives will inform a caption. If this doesn't work, I get my girlfriend, Sofi to write a caption -- she's very good."

Dead Writer Digression

2010-01-29T00:01:00.001-08:00

I had a bet going once about who would eventually be responsible for what J.D. Salinger would think the most serious of transgressions: The unauthorized production of a blockbuster movie based on his book "The Catcher in the Rye." Jerry Lewis and Steven Spielberg have already tried. The man without a genre - James Cameron - is probably salivating over Salinger's death last night. Perhaps there is a distant cousin who is going to pull a Widow Seuss-like move and cash in on the hermetic writer's work. Maybe we will see Holden Caulfield greeting cards soon ("I hear you hurt like hell. Get well and stuff.") Gross.

Here's a story from The Onion about Salinger's sensibilities as a literary artist.

Polke on Drawing

2010-01-28T00:01:00.000-08:00

Sigmar Polke has said he relies on drawing "to fix an idea."

"Mostly drawings are things I make for myself — I do them in sketchbooks... They are mental experiments — private inner thoughts when I'm not sure what will come out."

"Why Can't I Stop Smoking?" 1964

66 15/16" x 47 7/16", dispersion and charcoal on canvas

These last two images are very large works on paper (gouache and acrylic) that Polke created during the 1970s, when he was a part of a satiric movement in Germany called "Capitalist Realism." Many of these drawings are like overlapped transparencies on spot color fields, and are a commentary on consumerism, politics in postwar Europe, and conventions in artmaking (because art is always about art, but I repeat myself). David Salle capitalized on this technique in many of his classic paintings:

Sigmar Polke

2010-01-27T00:01:00.000-08:00

"Untitled: 2001-06," Artificial resin on polyester fiber, 53 3/4 x 46 inches

"An artist often identified with the willful opacity of American postmodernists like David Salle and Julian Schnabel." - Art in America on Sigmar Polke, April 1999

John Baldessari once referred to German artist Sigmar Polke as an "artist's artist," because of Polke's instigation in so many postmodern miracles of art. Said Baldessari, "Any one move can provide a career for a lesser artist." Born in 1941, Polke's visual language is full of references to the news, both current and past; popular culture; science, art history (because all art is about making art) and the malleable fable, as well as his mavericky use of materials.

h: 86.6 x w: 181.1 in acrylic on fabric, 1983

But what about Polke's drawings? We'll take a closer look tomorrow.

Layering with David Salle

2010-01-26T00:01:00.000-08:00

David Salle draws on pornography, kitsch, and even other art in his work, overlaying these images in deliberately different styles to call attention to his various reference points. When I was enrolled at SVA in the early 1980s, Salle was a sought-after studio painting instructor and I could not get a spot in his class. "Painting" had been declared dead by the art world, but Salle was continuing to make it important by drawing over his paintings with new indices of meaning.

Kay Tuttle's Approach

2010-01-25T00:01:00.000-08:00

There are many approaches to drawing.

One can go at it in an effort to record something observed, and base the quality of the results upon how closely the drawing resembles the thing being rendered. Another approach may be to explore materials -- trying pencil and then charcoal and maybe watercolor, et al, with or without a visual reference point to prompt the artist. Drawing like this can be spontaneous and quixotic, or have a basis in something very formal. Of course, drawing can be narrative or schematic. Both are representational, and both rely on visual storytelling symbology.

The list goes on, and every approach validates drawing as a form of art. Overall, these methods are probably taken for granted by the wide world, so that when a really interesting approach appears, it stands out in stark relief.

Kay Tuttle, "Bête Noire," 2008, 6’ x 6’ Acrylic on cut plywood & wall

Denver artist Kay Tuttle has been watching her father draw things her whole life. Recently she started using these drawings as a starting point for her own work, by drawing on top of her father's imagery:

The result is an overlaying of images that tell different stories but also a story as a whole. Her dad's masculine symbology -- airplanes, tanks, ships and soldiers -- are dressed with Tuttle's flowers and patterns and bits of nature to form a new visual language:

"I try to treat them as found surfaces, reacting to the marks, colors, and subject matter he has chosen. Psychologically it can be difficult as sometimes I erase or obliterate what he drew through marks and value," Tuttle says about this particular group of works on paper. She also remarks that "Thematically the drawings develop into nature versus machine."

View more of Tuttle's re-markable work at her website, www.kaytuttle.com.

Bunnies

2010-01-24T00:01:00.000-08:00

This post is merely transitional, to use up some pictures of bunnies cluttering my desktop. The first four are of mixed media on paper by Kay Tuttle, 2006.

The last two are from an old how-to book about drawing (thanks for the scans, Danelle!)

We'll get in to Tuttle's work in more depth tomorrow.

Las Vegas Drawings

2010-01-23T00:01:00.000-08:00

Nothing on Google, but the No. 2 search engine, You Tube, has this result for "Las Vegas Drawings:"

Learning from Las Vegas

2010-01-22T00:01:00.000-08:00

This is the original architectural drawing of the Stardust hotel sign, born on the Vegas Strip in 1958 and razed in 2006. As a flashing neon sign, its planetary-galactic theme was beyond seductive. But even without the high voltage, its twinkling is idiomatic of the artist's style.

Who exactly conceived of this design is disputed, but here is some excellent history on it.

And here is a link to the brilliant 1972 book that discusses "The Forgotten Symbolism of Architectural Form," (or "The Physiognomy of a Typical Casino Sign,") by Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown.

2010-01-21T23:29:00.001-08:00

Las Vegas a la Ralph Steadman

2010-01-21T00:01:00.001-08:00

After three days in Las Vegas attending a summit at one of the big hotels, I've decided to dedicate the next few days' posts to drawing inspired by what was my dad's favorite place on earth. Above is the seminal work by Ralph Steadman for the Hunter S. Thompson novel "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas." It's a wonderful example of characterization and spontaneous ink splotchiness. But I think it also exhibits some amazing draftsmanship.

Enjoy an overview of some of Steadman's work in this video:

Steadman's ink work is so distinct, it inspired a font called "Deadman," which is downloadable here.

This video, from the Criterion Collection DVD of "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, offers a glimpse into Steadman's technique, demonstrated by Steadman himself:

Something Really Ethereal:

2010-01-19T00:01:00.000-08:00

In 1949, Picasso drew these pictures in the air with a flashlight. A Life magazine photographer documented the whole thing. I did something quite similar as a child, with those sparklers they only handed out on the Fourth of July, but nobody recorded any pictures of it.

More Historical Renderings:

2010-01-18T00:01:00.000-08:00

Portraiture by Vic Harville of the Stephens Media Group.

Artist Dwane Powell's depiction of a U.S. conservative political figurehead in action.

Haitian History Lesson

2010-01-17T00:01:00.000-08:00

"Battle on Santo Domingo" (detail), by Polish military painter January Suchodolski, is a remarkable image depicting the successful Haitian slave revolt against the French. Until Pat Robertson quipped that the mayhem of this week's 7.0 earthquake in Haiti was because of that revolt, I never bothered to research the topic. (Robertson, BTW, blamed Hurricane Katrina on God's anger over abortion.) The Haitian uprising Suchodolski painted established the first republic in modern times to be led by people of African descent. It kicked Napoleon's ass to the curb and helped give Jefferson the nerve to make the Louisiana Purchase.
This painting was made to record history - a reason for art-making that peaked in the 19th century and gave way to Modernism.

Reference to Haiti

2010-01-16T00:01:00.000-08:00

"Haiti may be something out of the past or the future... but this country has very little to do with the present." This was the observation of British sculptor John Buckley on a recent visit to the Caribbean. "Haiti is a surreal country. Everything is larger than life. Where else can you find a military dictator who doesn't send his citizens off to war to be killed, he shoots them down himself on the home front? Where else do people in a voodoo trance kiss a pig to death? Where do families see the devil strolling down the street? Where is Aids running riot?" How could Buckley know his observations were pre-apocalyptic?

Swoon Enough

2010-01-15T00:01:00.000-08:00

One last image by Swoon for now.

Until we check in with her again, check out this link:

www.historyofgraffitiart.com

I came across this while researching the last few days' posts. A nice guy named Frank Essink in the Netherlands provides this e-book download "Vandals and Crusaders" free of charge, and includes a "Graffiti History Course." Not sure what that is yet but I am looking forward to his next e-mail!

Swoon Me

2010-01-14T00:01:00.000-08:00

These are great examples of Swoon's papercut technique. She makes rough drawings and then slices the images out of stacked sheets of paper, creating a sort of limited print run. The papercuts become almost translucent when absorbed into the surface on which they are plastered. They are like living organisms, the artist has said.

I like the way this image is altered by its context (above).

But what about this context (below)?

It's actually a gallery space - Deitch Projects' Art Basel Miami.

For me, the work doesn't have nearly the same power, not only because its raucousness is contrived, but because only the elite will ever see it:

Who wants to see street art in a gallery? WHO knows it's there?

Monswoon

2010-01-13T00:01:00.000-08:00

Swoon makes big drawings of people - portraits of friends and figures she encounters on the streets in New York City. She draws these images on big planks of Linoleum or wood, and painstakingly carves out the negative spaces with carving tools and her trusty Dremel. Then she takes a giant litho roller and inks up their surfaces, and lays down big sheets of paper and walks on them to transfer the images. Sometimes the paper she uses is from Chinese newspapers, which texturizes the drawings and ladens on even more meaning.

When she has printed multiples of each image, she cuts them out and attaches them with wheat paste on exteriors around the city, mostly on the Lower East Side. Over time, the drawings begin to blend into the backgrounds and alter or take on meaning. Pidgeon poop, truck exhaust, tagging, or scars of any order become a part of these images.

Swoon in the Streets

2010-01-12T00:01:00.000-08:00

When I was living in NYC in the early 1980s, I loved to walk everywhere, because every block of city was permeable to the random affronts of graffiti artists. Along with miles of stylized, spray-painted script, I might come across something by Keith Haring or Jean Michel Basquiat. Neither had quite yet made it huge in the art world, and both were still alive. The Lower East Side is still awash with amazing images steeped in the process of decay, either by passersby or demolition or the weather. But they are made by what we now call "street artists," and my favorite is Swoon.

Over the next few days we'll explore her work.

Signmaker's Sketchbook

2010-01-11T00:01:00.000-08:00

Like Francesco (well, not exactly) I, too, was a sign painter. The above example from my sketchbook is the concept for a work that now hangs over the nutritional bars and supplements at the Trader Joe's store in Crystal Cove, California.

Francesco Clemente is Dreamy

2010-01-10T00:01:00.000-08:00

I do not know from whence this image came. I collected it to my desktop a while ago, without attribution and absent of specs. I'm posting it anyway because unless I do, I will keep craving it, like a frosted cinnamon bun in the bakery window at the Looney Bean. It is a work on paper of Francesco Clemente's mind. I know for a time, the Italian artist worked with sign painters in India, and has said his imagery is the stuff of dreams and symbols, life and death, sex and self-portraiture.

Chakaia Booker: The Rubber Queen

2010-01-09T00:01:00.000-08:00

Open Chat, 2009, Acrylic and acid free paper on wood, 24" x 12" x 3"

Never Mind, 2006, Rubber tire, wood, steel, 67 x 46 x 48 inches

Chakaia Booker appropriates rubber tires in her work, which makes her a recycling role model for the rest of us. She has reinterpreted tons of Goodyear and Firestone products in a socio-anthropological statement about our place in the environment. But I really love her works on paper for their simple beauty, though I imagine they are fraught with references to rubber. The Newark, New Jersey native is, not surprisingly, a past recipient of the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Award.

Stephen Talasnik's Panoramas

2010-01-08T00:01:00.000-08:00

Surveyor, 2009
Collage and acrylic on prepared wood panel, 72 x 24 inches

Stephen Talasnik makes fantastical images inspired by futuristic architectural forms, transportation systems and urban landscapes. Many of his graphite-on-paper works force an imagined cross between Paul Klee and Frank Lloyd Wright (at least for me).

Precarious Prediction, 2008
graphite on paper
12 x 60 inches

I <3 Brendan Monroe

2010-01-07T00:01:00.000-08:00

Wednesday was a shitty day, so to cheer myself up I am dedicating Thursday's post to Brendan Monroe. His images make me very happy. If you have not yet discovered his work, here is what his Etsy profile says: "Brendan Monroe is an artist who digs through science to find loose references for his paintings and sculptures. He highlights large blob-like figures, interconnected red cellular shapes and tiny imaginary organisms. Brendan lives and works in Stockholm, Sweden."

MoMA Attempts to Define 'Drawing'

2010-01-06T10:12:00.000-08:00

"Last month, Christian Rattemeyer, the Harvey S. Shipley Miller Associate Curator of Drawings and organizer of the sprawling Compass in Hand exhibition at MoMA in NYC, convened an evening symposium on the role of drawing in contemporary art. That this subject remains a popular discussion topic was evidenced by hundreds of artists, scholars, curators, and patrons who assembled to listen to panelists Isabelle Dervaux, Curator of Modern and Contemporary Drawings at The Morgan Library & Museum, Carter Foster, Curator of Drawings at The Whitney Museum of American Art, and artists Gareth James and Charline von Heyl, lend their scholarly and technical expertise on the matter.

After ruminating on the intellectual and philosophical implications of drawing as artistic practice in their respective presentations, one audience member raised what was perhaps the most salient point of the evening: Why the need to define drawing? And to what end?

The struggle to ascertain the significance of the drawn mark in order to arrive at a fundamental definition of drawing – one that is more inclusive than a mere set of material and technical procedures – has fueled intellectual debate for decades. In fact, one of The Drawing Center’s founding tenets was to challenge the conceptual and material boundaries of drawing in order to up end conventional notions about the discipline.

While the MoMA symposium did not produce a clear definition of drawing that is specific to the present generation of artists, scholars, and curators, it did reveal a certain anxiety among artists and scholars to delineate what drawing means now."

-Stephanie Schumann, Editor 12.18.09 (original post)

Ernesto Caivano's Natural World

2010-01-05T10:22:00.001-08:00

Ernesto Caivano's pencil and ink drawings make me think of classic botanical renderings meant to deconstruct simple biological systems. And I suppose they are - except these systems reside only in Caivano's alternate world. These drawings, from a suite called "Floral Veins and Conduits" (2006), are barely 7"X10," but loaded with references to global warming, the nature/technology chasm and natural selection gone awry.

Jenny Saville: Plotting the Body

2010-01-04T10:04:00.000-08:00

"Images are made with other images in mind."

Jean-Luc Godard

Today's Drawing

2010-01-03T16:29:00.000-08:00

Joe Brubaker /cont.

2010-01-02T18:13:00.003-08:00

These pages are from the artist's self-published journal "Somnambulists." Here's a 29.11-minute video tour of his work, which forgoes the cynicism of the contemporary art world in favor of the old-fashioned belief that art-making is "magic." A nice thought for the New Year.

The Halo Effect

2010-01-01T20:04:00.000-08:00

Joe Brubaker uses drawing to help him figure out how he is going to assemble found materials in his figurative sculpture. He says "The individual creative process generates a 'halo' effect that is more significant than the individual creative act."

I bought his book "Somnambulists," and enjoy studying it to try to find clues to Brubaker's creative process. I can only guess at it. But I have begun keeping a box in the garage where I stash odd hunks of metal and wood and twisted wire found on my daily hikes on Eastern Sierra range land. A sketchbook will someday help me figure out what I am meant to do with it all.

Fay Ku Folklore

2009-12-19T09:54:00.000-08:00

Room For Only One II (2005)
Graphite, ink and watercolor on gray paper
38 X 50 inches
From the artist's statement: "I never have any pre-conceived notion of what the work will look like, and I never sketch beforehand. I work to discover what I am thinking, and I have to find my way to the image." Represented by Sam Lee Gallery, Los Angeles.

Dr. Seuss Told Us To:

2009-12-16T18:37:00.001-08:00

A book project inspired by a bumper sticker that was inspired by Dr. Seuss' "The Lorax." Bunches of artists and writers (many posthumously) contribute to the cause.

Rendering Motion

2009-12-07T12:01:00.000-08:00

Jennifer Pastor uses drawing to break down various systems -- in this case, the circulation of a rider on a bucking bull. (pencil on paper, 13 1/2" X 17", 1999-2000)

Bee Keeper Girl, 2003

2009-12-04T21:00:00.000-08:00

I saw this drawing in a gallery in Culver City about 3 years ago. The artist, Anthony Goicolea, is a photographer who began drawing to further explore some of the strange scenarios he deliberately composed for the camera. The ghostly effect is achieved with a semi-opaque mylar overlay. As I recall, the drawing was nearly life-size, and impressed me enough that I purchased the $50 companion book of prints, which I cherish.

Today's Drawing:

2009-12-02T20:29:00.000-08:00

Book Sale @ The Drawing Center!

2009-12-01T13:35:00.000-08:00

Discounts on books & limited editions In-store only from December 1 - 23. How lucky are people who live in NYC?

2009-11-27T15:36:00.001-08:00

This blog is attached to my website, "Drawings and Digressions." It has a link to my hiking/drawing workshops and to my Etsy store, which is still under construction. Stay tuned...

Jim Houser is a genius

2009-11-20T21:56:00.000-08:00

http://vimeo.com/2297046

Did you draw anything today?

2009-11-20T21:29:00.000-08:00

I was out walking the dog today near the canal. The wind was howling and the sun was stuck behind a cloud formation they call the Sierra Wave. The water flowing through this landscape is crystalline, and if you don't mind a little cow piss, almost drinkable. All the trees are barely holding on to their leaves. A bird -- I think it was a kingfisher -- flew right by me, and the dog alighted after it and straight across the canal, coming out the other side and running head on into a pair of mules. The surprise on his face was only a small part of the thing that inspired me. Next time I will bring a sketchpad.

(BTW, I also do this blog: http://mudsocks.blogspot.com.)