Notes on Project 2 - Intermedia Drawing Challenges

Exploring Artists from The Drawing Center's Viewing Program
(http://legacy.drawingcenter.org/viewingprogram/search_result.html)

Mark Booth
(www.markbooth.net)

              


   

Artist's statement:

"My artistic practice is interdisciplinary. I make sound works, drawings, paintings, installations, performances, and text-works which explore thought, language, systems, and cataloging. The unifying factor in a majority of my work is the phenomena of language as a mediator of experience. I am interested in the human voice, not only what we say aloud, but also the ignored impulses, ideas, and fleeting jokes that we voice within ourselves.

My drawings often incorporate fragmented texts contained within diagrammatic and biomorphic forms, often situated on, within, or in response to abstract fields. These drawings piece together cryptic conglomerations of speech that don’t quite dovetail seamlessly into linear fictions yet inhabit the same structural formations. These humorous, profane, banal, unsettling statements and proto-narratives, embedded in their enclosing forms, can be read as un-scientific illustrations of sensations and thoughts blooming in the mind, as memorials to passing thought, as maps of cognitive cul-de-sacs, or charts of unstable memory.

My art begins with the investigation of simple questions, questions that ultimately invite further possibility and produce additional directions for inquiry. I believe that the work reflects a wry humor that, combined with the deceptive simplicity of the visual and sonic forms, allows entry into larger more complex issues of consciousness."

(www.drawingcenter.org/viewingprogram/portfolio9339.html?pf=2342)

I was interested in Mark Booth's artwork for the colors and the handwritten words. The colors and shapes are pleasing to look at and the random mix of words and phrases reminds me of magnet poetry. I like the puzzle of trying to figure out what the text could mean.

Mark's exploration of "language as a mediator of experience" intrigued me. Last year, I took a beginning Communications class. The professor stressed the importance of communication (verbal, written, or otherwise) as a central framework for the human experience. The way Mark's art blends these modes of communication, through visual representations and the written word, is a beautiful and poetic exploration of the many ways to create a "drawing."


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Jeffrey Beebe
(www.jeffreybeebe.com)

                             

             

Artist's statement: 

"Over the last fifteen years, I have created the world of Refractoria, a comprehensive 

imagino-ordinary world that is equal parts autobiography and pure fantasy."

(www.drawingcenter.org/viewingprogram/portfolio5496.html?pf=4865)

When I first saw Jeffrey Beebe's art, I thought I was just looking at some nicely drawn maps. Then, I saw the labels such as "The Vast Nonsense" and "Persistent Material." When I read his statement, I was instantly hooked - his creation of a whole fantasy land, yet autobiographical in nature, fascinated me. As a child, I was constantly imagining either I was a different person or living in some other made-up, magical place. I felt like I could relate to this imaginary, mentally-inhabited place Jeffrey had created, even though I've never thought up anything this complicated and detailed before.

I looked up more of his work on his website, and was drawn to his reimagined set of tarot cards. While I personally don't believe in divination/occult uses of tarot cards, I am interested in the iconography. The structure of the major/minor arcana/suits is an interesting backdrop for various artist interpretations. I especially like Jeffrey's irreverent and darkly humorous version. His rendering and line work are impeccable, and the choice of watercolors adds movement and depth to his illustrations. I like the suits he created: heartaches, mediocrities, despairs, and stagnations. The depiction of these abstract concepts through a cohesive mix of symbols, characters, and locations has the effect of inviting the viewer to become part of his imagined world.