Over three years ago, 2005, Edna suggested we work together on a painting. The result was interesting at best, but it was great fun sloshing and splashing the paint in response to each other. We got together two or three more times to paint. There was no premeditation, except for the size of the format. No rules. Everything was allowed. We painted over, out, beside each other’s efforts until we agreed on an ending point. If one of us wanted to interrupt the other in mid brush stroke, that was ok too. I liked each of us having to contend with the other’s marks, color patches, splashes and blops. In the fall, October 2006, we thought it might be interesting to draw together. Eliminating color and paint would greatly simplify the process and allow us to see more clearly what kind of images would emerge.
A few weeks later we got together again to draw. We armed ourselves with vine charcoal, black pastel and cheap 18 x 24 paper tacked to the wall. I found drawing this way even more exciting than the painting. The process was quick and direct. Responding to each other's marks was very engaging. We settled on using black pastel, because we liked its dense, velvety blackness, and it smears, smudges and erases in a very painterly way. More drawing sessions followed.
Typically, we get together in her studio or mine about 9:30 AM. We look over the preceding session’s work to see what we do and do not like. Next, we draw with abandon on cheap paper until midday, when we have lunch. About 1:00 PM we get out the good paper and get serious. We draw until about 3:30. We tack up our results as we go.
The whole process is very much like playing a game. It is a series of moves and countermoves, a progression, a lengthening chain, a growth. We play with one another, not against one another. When the process works, the result is not a winner and loser, but a successful drawing. In silence we talk with our marks. Edna makes a move; I make a move; we make a move at the same time. One of us makes a mark or two. The other makes a mark. A mark gets erased or strengthened or enlarged. A drawing results.
These drawings are not abstract. The subject of these drawings is the marks and rhythm and the spatial illusion they create. They are about the act of marking and arranging the marks in a visually interesting way. If there is any premeditation, it is to avoid any combination of marks that may be read as something. For the first time, I think, I have experienced what musicians, actors and dancers probably experience all the time: the joy of creatively improvising with another artist. | Click images for details. Click images for details. |
