Her father was an artist, so she became one too. Her favorite medium was simply pencil. The detail she could depict with just that tool was amazing, and it brought her many compliments. Perhaps not as much money as she might wish, but a few prizes. It was a focused life. Drawing took time. Days, hours. Her eyes ached. Setting up yet another still life, she wondered what it would be like to NOT draw.
And then, she found herself NOT drawing. Had she left it, or had it left her? She didn’t know. Her heart was empty. She wandered the house staring at objects without seeing the lines and shadows, without itching to reproduce the form on paper. In her sad travels around the house, she saw a camera. She had bought it months ago to take better pictures of her art.
She had a whirlwind affair with the camera. It seemed to want to go out and explore the world, so she took it everywhere. Scenes that would have taken her hours to sketch could be possessed at the press of a button. She knew it was too easy, but she loved it anyway. She bought a huge new computer monitor to view the pictures. Her senses were overwhelmed. Her judgement took a vacation. Compositions she would never have been satisfied with as drawings struck her as genius work.
She called her father to tell him: “I think I’m going to be a photographer now.” He wasn’t sure it was a good idea, and asked her what had happened. “It left me,” was all she could say. “Maybe you need some color,” her father said. He was a painter. She had worked in only black and white for the last three years. Perhaps he was right.
She had loved the refined world of drawing, the exquisite detachment announced by a beautiful black and white drawing of, for instance, the corner of a room with its baseboard, its old chair, its uneven wall. It was as if each molecule of the ordinary world had been given its chance to shine. She missed it. She had moved on too quickly. Would it take her back?
Looking through the camera lens at a patch of weeds near the park, she felt that the little machine was not really showing her what she thought it had at first. Yes, there was color, but the camera made no decisions about what was or was not important. It was indiscriminate. Promiscuous. It had learned nothing from her. But maybe she had learned something from it.
At the art supply store, she contemplated the fantastic array of colored pencils. She could get a complete set, but that was daunting. If she were going to use color sparingly, what colors would be the most expressive? A dark red. A green-blue. A yellow. Almost primary. She would return to drawing with this offering. Maybe it would take her back.
Eagerly, she went to her studio and placed the new pencils on the table. She opened up her 18x24 Strathmore tablet and put it on the easel. She draped a gray cloth on top of a wooden block and set the small camera carefully on it at a rakish angle. She wanted to create a portrait of this transitory object of her affections, partly in gratitude, partly because it seemed a challenge. The little machine lacked character, and she was going to give it some. It would be larger than life in this drawing, it would have edges, lines, textures, form and shadows, and yes, a few dashes of red and yellow, despite itself.
Then, inspired, she went to her desk in the corner, disconnected the new computer monitor and brought it into the set-up as a background for the main subject, the camera. She would include only part of its frame in the drawing. It, too, was a thing that tried to limit what it showed her just as the end of a piece of paper did. But she could make her own world on the piece of paper. There would be strokes of green-blue in the monitor’s blank stare.
She began. She was back.
— Macoff
And then, she found herself NOT drawing. Had she left it, or had it left her? She didn’t know. Her heart was empty. She wandered the house staring at objects without seeing the lines and shadows, without itching to reproduce the form on paper. In her sad travels around the house, she saw a camera. She had bought it months ago to take better pictures of her art.
She had a whirlwind affair with the camera. It seemed to want to go out and explore the world, so she took it everywhere. Scenes that would have taken her hours to sketch could be possessed at the press of a button. She knew it was too easy, but she loved it anyway. She bought a huge new computer monitor to view the pictures. Her senses were overwhelmed. Her judgement took a vacation. Compositions she would never have been satisfied with as drawings struck her as genius work.
She called her father to tell him: “I think I’m going to be a photographer now.” He wasn’t sure it was a good idea, and asked her what had happened. “It left me,” was all she could say. “Maybe you need some color,” her father said. He was a painter. She had worked in only black and white for the last three years. Perhaps he was right.
She had loved the refined world of drawing, the exquisite detachment announced by a beautiful black and white drawing of, for instance, the corner of a room with its baseboard, its old chair, its uneven wall. It was as if each molecule of the ordinary world had been given its chance to shine. She missed it. She had moved on too quickly. Would it take her back?
Looking through the camera lens at a patch of weeds near the park, she felt that the little machine was not really showing her what she thought it had at first. Yes, there was color, but the camera made no decisions about what was or was not important. It was indiscriminate. Promiscuous. It had learned nothing from her. But maybe she had learned something from it.
At the art supply store, she contemplated the fantastic array of colored pencils. She could get a complete set, but that was daunting. If she were going to use color sparingly, what colors would be the most expressive? A dark red. A green-blue. A yellow. Almost primary. She would return to drawing with this offering. Maybe it would take her back.
Eagerly, she went to her studio and placed the new pencils on the table. She opened up her 18x24 Strathmore tablet and put it on the easel. She draped a gray cloth on top of a wooden block and set the small camera carefully on it at a rakish angle. She wanted to create a portrait of this transitory object of her affections, partly in gratitude, partly because it seemed a challenge. The little machine lacked character, and she was going to give it some. It would be larger than life in this drawing, it would have edges, lines, textures, form and shadows, and yes, a few dashes of red and yellow, despite itself.
Then, inspired, she went to her desk in the corner, disconnected the new computer monitor and brought it into the set-up as a background for the main subject, the camera. She would include only part of its frame in the drawing. It, too, was a thing that tried to limit what it showed her just as the end of a piece of paper did. But she could make her own world on the piece of paper. There would be strokes of green-blue in the monitor’s blank stare.
She began. She was back.
— Macoff
Intriguing for sure. Funny how different mediums impact one at different times but it's always art to the rescue. Nicely organized and written.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of an artist described in An Anthropologist from Mars who suddenly became colorblind after an auto accident. Intriguing idea.
ReplyDeleteYou so perfectly describe the relationship between the artist and the medium. The details 18x24 Strathmore tablet. Beautiful
ReplyDelete