17 1/2″ x 12″ graphite
Sketchy Self-Portrait
Gallery
Cormac McCarthy, 3′ 2″ x 1’5″
This piece, on torn wrapping paper, contains a drawing in regular and water soluble graphite. Rather than activating the graphite with a wet brush I have used a fine spray bottle.
“Across the Universe” 8/20/22
This is a 2’6” x 1’6″ poster of John Lennon, made with India ink on arches watercolor paper.
Nasielski 1938 Sketches (Spring of 2022)
These graphite & charcoal sketches are 8 1/2″ by 5 1/2″ and represent faces and scenes that appear in a 1938 film taken by an American tourist named David Kurtz in the Jewish quarter of the Polish village of Nasielski. Although the film is only a few minutes long it is a poignant testament to the humanity of a community on the brink of unspeakable horror. My maternal grandparents were Jewish refugees who escaped Poland in 1939 with my mother, and who ended up in Gulag before arriving in the United States. For these sketches, I wanted to dwell on some of the fleeing faces and moments in Kurtz’s video, which you can read about and watch here (there are 2-3 Kurtz film clips on a slider). Kurtz’s film is also the subject of a new documentary: trailer here. My sketches were made in the Spring of 2022.
My first poster of 2022; 4′ by 3′.
Two quick author sketches: Henry James and Jorge Luis Borges
Three from 50+ “chronicle of monsters” art book
Fernando Pessoa
The rest of my posted pictures here.
Playlist Postcards
What would we do without our playlists? How would we arrange our memories and lift them up out of the dark?
The rest of my posted pictures here.
Two Walt Whitman Poster Portraits
“Walt Whitman, 1854” is based on a daguerreotype portrait that was probably used to model the face of Whitman for the iconic, illustrated frontispiece of Leaves of Grass in 1855. It’s my favorite photograph of Whitman because it does not conform to the grandpa Walt archetype. My rendering of this daguerreotype tells the story of the terror of working with india ink, as well as its pleasures. Terror: the undiluted shadow on the side of his nose; I doubted if I should continue after that error. Pleasure: the pointed shape on the cheek, a spontaneous, and unplanned arc of ink that I could not make so well if I had planned it beforehand. For me, working with ink is about letting it do what it wants, to not force it. The pleasure of this kind of work is some unpredictability. “Walt Whitman, 1860s” is based on a Matthew Brady photograph that was probably taken in 1862 or 1863. I generally struggle with capturing a likeness of the bearded Whitman but beard textures and shadows are fun to explore with ink.
The rest of my posted pictures here.
Christopher Conway 