DEFINING DRAWING

One of the most important methods of making images in THE THREADS PROJECT  was drawing. To continue, if you will excuse me, this thread, here are works which further explore ways to make linear marks-drawing-by combining textile elements and materials with those considered in a more traditional light, such as paper.

COMBINING ELEMENTS

THREADS 2002″]

 MANHATTAN THREADS 2002 Charcoal, thread, sumi ink, with embossing, erasing and acrylic medium on watercolor paper. 9 x 12 inches.

 “Manhattan Threads” was created while living in Manhattan fairly early in THE THREADS PROJECT. The Lab Pieces were underway as I explored possibilities for using the linear quality of thread as a drawing medium and ultimately as the subject as well. In this piece the format of pairs was again used to make images that were at once analogous and also combined the most basic element of cloth, thread. I used a variety of techniques to create the linear quality-embossing, erasing, and the use of thread in a singular manner as well as a mass of it. As with many of the early THREADS pieces, the palette was limited to black, white, and red which I determined early on to establish a cohesiveness to the work. The goal here, as with all using the concept and format of pairs was to prevent the viewer from making an immediate judgment of value based on material or process.

Visual Energy 2003″]THREADS-VISUAL ENERGY Colored pencil on black paper  27.5 x 19.5 inches

Here the idea of thread became the subject. There could be an interplay back and forth of subject and “medium”. By this point in the “Project” it was clear there would be far more work than merely a “series” as originally imagined. I longed for color in both works on paper and cloth.

Although not meant to be paired, the idea of “analogous” images was clearly at work in these two pieces from 2003. I could expand into a more dimensional use of thread than just the flat surface of paper.

2003″]

 SINGULAR 2003 Thread, machine-sewn to tulle, hand-sewn to Okawara paper    14 x 11.75 inches.

In SINGULAR” thread is both medium and subject. Buried beneath the swirl of cream threads is a single black thread.

Colored pencil, pastel, thread, paper on black paper 26.75 x 19.5  inches

“CROSSES”  uses the idea of analogous techniques between cloth and paper. The paper serves the same purpose as cloth would. The squares of paper are “collaged” by actually being sewn to the ground of the paper. The distinction of cloth and paper is further blurred by combining crosses of white thread with those of pastel.

Is this a drawing? Or that nebulous “work on paper”?

More about methods used to investigate and expand definitions of drawing can be found on my Page, EXPLORING DRAWING. These include frottage, embossing, erasing and other techniques.