Drawing Challenges
- ebark91
- Sep 21, 2020
- 3 min read
INSPIRATION:
Walter Price, Scarecrow, 2020, Graphite, gel pen, Scotch tape, burned paper, color pencil, and Sharpie on manila tagboard paper, 12 x 9 inches (30.5 x 22.9 cm), Courtesy of the artist and Greene Naftali, New York
Fred Tomaselli, March 21, 2020, 2020, Acrylic, collage, and archival inkjet print on watercolor paper, 11 x 12 inches (28 x 30.5 cm), Courtesy of the artist and James Cohan
PART 1:
I decided to alter sunglasses by painting the lenses. I've been interested in the idea of altering reflections to convey what we really want to see, or wish we were seeing. I call these glasses dream goggles, as they show what we wish we were seeing when checking the surf on a flat day such as this one. I made a video to show my idea behind the glasses.
PART 2:
Material: Leaf
Process: Cutting
Theme: Ephemeral, Freedom
I thought it would be neat to work with organic materials to portray another organic life form, so I decided to carve into a leaf to create a bird. A bird seemed fitting as I was cutting out, creating free, empty space, which would go with a bird in flight's weightlessness and freedom. Cutting into the leaf was a bit different than paper, as some shapes went against the natural grain of the leaf. The leaf shriveled over the next few days; the photo is from about 6 days after the original cut.
Material: Foam Dust
Process: Drawing, Walking
Theme: Erosion, Life
For this piece, I drew a portrait of what I may look like when I am older, and then went about working for about 30 minutes. Working consisted of walking back and forth while sanding foam, which eroded the picture I had drawn on the ground and added more foam in the air which settled over the portrait as well. It was kind of funny to see the portrait fade into the ground, and reminded me of how when we get older, people get forgotten, fade into the background, and sadly are not treated like full people all the time. Further, as I walked back and forth, it represented the natural rhythms of life wearing us down as we age. I was not trying to destroy this portrait, I was merely doing what I had to do to get my work done. When I cleaned up the shop after work, I swept the remains, fully clearing the portrait and sweeping the dust into a pile before putting it in the trash.
Material: Magazine
Process: Cutting
Theme: Deconstruction, Obsession
For this piece, I cut out phrases from "The Good Life" magazine and recreated the cover with the prominent themes I saw inside the magazine. I didn't enjoy this, as I don't really enjoy these types of magazines, so flipping through it, I was made uncomfortable by all the ads and articles that seemed as if they were trying to make me feel bad so that I would buy something. By deconstructing the magazine and putting it back together, I didn't really change the message of it, but I brought out the key themes and put them on the newly remade cover. By doing this I aimed to call attention to our obsession with what the good life means-- not even to ourselves, but to what the media portrays it as-- being thin, youthful looking, radiant, wealthy, etc..
Material: Newspaper
Process: Painting, Erasing
Theme: Hope
I wanted to revisit the theme of seeing what we want to see that I explore in Part 1, so I decided to alter a newspaper to show some news that we would all be happy to see arrive on our driveways. I painted over scenes of fires and instead painted medals on the firefighters pictured, and painted over words to make the news how it will (hopefully) be when the fires are extinguished.
Inspired by Fred Tomaselli's piece.
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