Experimentation in Media and Marks

Javon Twice, Simultaneous...

A few tub studies, from the clawfoot in my Grand Rapids studio. These are all Conte on mylar.

Revisiting Reflections

A drawing I finished a few months ago- a neat little experiment with the mirror. I love the way the figures merge together at the mirror's surface in a tangle of reflected light. The pose suggests she is hiding, but in the mirror-reflection we see her face revealed.

Charcoal on paper, 50"X36"

I think it gets more interesting when I flip the drawing, especially in person as the figures are pretty large. They begin to look like two separate figures lying together, I think it has tremendous potential for future ideas. I think this drawing started some of my two figure work as seen below, but looking at it again gives me new ideas.

Working title: Duress

47"X30"

Mixed media on mylar

I am having a difficult time coming up with a finished title for this one. I feel it is so multi-layered in it's conceptuality and I don't want to limit what a viewer takes away. Let the discussion begin...

My latest drawing, as yet unfinished but largely whole. My first experience posing two models together. Interestingly out of a three hour session of sketching several poses, most of which had the female in the dominant position, I chose this pose as I thought it had the most potential to bring up questions. Questions regarding their implied relationship, why I chose these models, and why I chose this particular pose; both for me as the artist and my viewers.

This is a bit of a conceptual leap compared to what I have been doing, but not too far. As it is, my previous work used two figures within the context of an implied relationship, but always images of the same person. This drawing may lead to finding more ways to use the duality of two figures and their relationships to each other, whether one or two models.

Additionally I am using this drawing to begin a new exploration of mark-making, and many of my less sustained works are going even deeper into this exploration. When my work emerges from this I look forward to utilizing a new sense of the mark to further the conceptual elements in my work.

Feel free to give me your comments. I have put this image onto the public sphere to hear honest assessments!

Illusions of Form

I couldn't think of a better way to open my first blog than by documenting, presenting and discussing a point of culmination from this past two and a half years. April 14th, 2009 saw the opening of my BFA solo art exhibition, displaying the work I've done to complete my fine art drawing degree at Eastern Michigan University, and marking the point at which I prepare to enter graduate school to earn my Master of Fine Arts degree.

I have always been a visual artist, holding degrees in photography and drawing and having several showings of my work. But it was a few years ago that I decided to recommit myself to a goal I had since my first college life drawing class; to become a fine artist and educator. Life had directed me from that goal; drumming for a band that nearly hit it big, moving to the perpetual sunshine of Florida, returning to Michigan to start a business, then buying a house, earning a degree in photography and starting a family. When I decided to redefine myself once again and go back to school it could only be for the one thing I knew I could spend the rest of my life doing; making images in my favorite medium, drawing.

The beauty of drawing lies in its essential ingredients; perception, artistic creation and the most basic elements of compressed wood fibers and charred vine. I see drawing as the most essential art form on one hand, but the most meaningful and involved on the other. A drawing can be as simple as a line in the sand drawn with a stick, or as complex as the rendering of the human form with all the depth of humanity as its content.

The Show Emerges

Usually a BFA, or senior show exhibits the work a young artist has done in the pursuit of their undergraduate degree. The work may come from their different years at the school and even from different disciplines studied. At first I thought this is what my show would be. But I had been gaining an intense interest in figurative work over the last year, and in the process of applying to grad schools I had developed the beginnings of some solid concepts to my work. Then, when my major professor Michael Reedy said that my BFA show would be good, but not to the level of an MFA show, I took that as an outright challenge (that's not what he meant); I knew it may not be master's level work but I was going to push it to the highest level I could! Instantly I drew up new ideas for the gallery, decided to scrap most of the show and conceived new drawings that would fit with a group of successful drawings and ideas I had going. Of the fifteen drawings in the show 11 were created in the two months before the show opened. All of the drawings were completed in the last 6 months. I suppose this was a culmination of my undergraduate work after all.

Artist Statement

The objectives of my work look inward to the turmoil of the individual psyche. I am exploring the way in which mirrors destroy or create our sense of selves. Using isolated figures I portray the introverted, narcissistic and self-realizing act of viewing oneself in a mirror, revealing the sense of self as a desperate fiction; a symptom of being human. Within these drawings I explore the abstracting shapes of light that mirrors physically cast on my model’s bodies, visually contributing to themes of disillusionment and displacement.

The very act of looking in a mirror is the creation or destruction of self; ultimately without mirrors we would have no sense of identity, no sense of self except from the eyes and reactions of others. We rarely walk by a mirror without critically assessing our reflected images. Ultimately our day begins and ends with the way we perceive ourselves in the mirror.

The Drawings

Displacement 50"X32"

All of the drawings are large, with the framed ones measuring about 50" X 32" and the mounted ones at 46" X 24". All figures are at or near life size. All drawings started as charcoal on printmaker's paper with the works Disillusionment and the According to Light and Gravity series adding mixed media (tea stain, oil bar and glazes, turpentine and Conte crayon). All drawings were done from life. Of course, these small digital images tell nothing of the richness and depth of the drawings or the quality and importance of their finish. Try to get out and see some hand-made art once in awhile; there is nothing comparable in the digital or video realm.

Self-Illusions 50"X32", In Between 42"X24" (X2), Displacement 50"X32"

Disillusionment 50"X30"

Desperate Fiction 46"X30"

Self-Illusions 48"X32"

In preparing for the show I wanted the drawings to become connected with the gallery space. I conceived the ideas for the corner pieces In Between and On the Periphery and the across the room series According to Light and Gravity to utilize the wonderful space I was provided. I'm unsure of the next time I'll have such a great gallery to have a solo exhibition in, so I wanted to take full advantage of the space. Again, this is lost in the online realm; one must have been in the gallery to sense the whole effect.

Desperate Fiction 46"X30", On the Periphery 46"X24" (X3), one from the series According to Light and Gravity

In Between and On the Periphery are displayed just as they were created- placing the model in a corner reflected by two mirrors. One drawing places the emphasis on the missing figure, suggesting that the reflected images destroy the self. The other places the emphasis on the reflected images, suggesting that they create the self. The corners and the lighting arrangement are very important to these pieces and the use of a male in one corner opposed by the female in the other was also important. This could really be sensed in the gallery.

In Between 42"X24" (X2)

I used the light to suggest the absence of the figure, allowing the reflected figures to fade into darkness.

According to Light and Gravity

Art Historian and writer James Elkins:

Philosophers are sometimes fond of speaking about the cloudy flux of the self, but it is not at all easy to acknowledge the absence of an architecturally solid foundation- the indestructible, immutable “I.” If pictures are corrosive, it is because light itself is an acid: it burns into me: it remakes me in it’s own image.

In this series of work I have created 3 rendered images of the human figure mirrored against their reflections in a state of deterioration. If Elkins is right when he says...

Looking has force: it tears, it is sharp, it is an acid. In the end, it corrodes the object and observer until they are lost in the field of vision. I once was solid, and now I am dissolved: that is the voice of seeing.

...then my question is, ultimately which figure is deteriorating? Is the rendered figure the Self, facing down a physically corrosive reflection? Or is the dissolved image the Self, facing down a psychologically corrosive depiction of the body?

To achieve this state of deterioration I took the reflected drawings and scratched the surface with coarse sandpaper and rusted steel then reformed the images with oil bar and turpentine to give them an acidic texture, especially compared to the perfectly rendered images. The effect in the gallery is considerable when you are standing in the middle looking back and forth at the reflected images, trying to answer the question posed above for yourself.

Side by side showing the rendered versus the destroyed.

Interestingly, when I observed visitors to the gallery looking at the show I often noticed people were most interested in the destroyed drawings. Perhaps they were interested in the different techniques, perhaps it was the violence used on the human body's image. Whichever, I feel like that whole series was among my more successful work, as it gained the most attention from visitors as well as some of my professors. Ultimately I feel like I could have destroyed these pieces even further, or used another technique where I might limit how much I create the image, letting it emerge and dissolve in and out of the paper itself. Much more experimentation will be done based just on this series.

A Successful Show!

It was an amazing experience to create, hang and exhibit my first solo show in drawing. The most important people in my personal life and professional pursuits came to the opening and I received tremendous encouragement, I feel I have chosen the right path for myself. I will spend the rest of the summer spending time with my family, working on some new drawing ideas, and preparing for my first semester at Kendall College of Art and Design in September, where I will be working to earn my Master of Fine Arts degree. I am intested in seeing how my work evolves there. In the meantime I will post some of my latest work here and will always consider your feedback.

To purchase any of the drawings you have seen please feel free to contact me via email.