Alan Rutherford

Things about drawing that I have been thinking about lately

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about drawing. Several things this year have re-awoken my interest in drawing. Its a realisation of how important drawing is one’s practice as an artist. Drawing has had a lot of critics of the last 20 years or so I would say, with artists abandoning it in favour of other approaches. I think that drawing is essential to us for various reasons. I’m not going to try and order them into an ascending or descending list of importance. Well, not for the moment anyway. So here are some thoughts on drawing.

• We can take for granted that we live in a physical 3-Dimensional world. We can lose all appreciation of it’s complexity and how either the built of natural environment is constructed. By making a drawing we look at the subject and have to vector this information to our brain and then convert it into a 2-Dimensional rendering on a flat surface. This is not easy.
• Drawing creates a balance between our existentialist anxieties and our acceptance and position within nature.
• I used to do a lot of drawing. in fact a long time ago a won a prize for drawing. I’m not the best drawer by any standard, but what it does teach is observational skills. The discipline of looking and recording.
• Drawing has a greater value in terms of recalling the memory of a place. Assuming that a drawing was made at a place, then looking back at the drawing in the future yields far greater information and sensations as opposed to a photograph. Creating the drawing is a more directly ‘lived experience’.
• The criticality of drawing is interesting, as it seems to harbour a lot of freedom. For example we can throw a few lines, shapes, materials or colours onto the paper and instantly the viewer can relate to this and applies the sematic label of a ‘drawing’. This gives allows it to bypass the same scrutiny criteria that would be applied to new media for example i.e .the unfamiliar.
• Drawing should be a central part of the process of thinking as an artist and should be harnessed.
• Drawing is a sensitive detection device. It is a recording process, of detecting and sensing the presence or something and it’s past history.

The following shows and people have also been of interest and influence:

Henry Moore’s drawings

Over the years I’ve made quite a few visits to the art galleries in Leeds and have always enjoyed looking at Henry Moore’s drawings. Maybe they remind me of my own drawings and the way Moore feels for the shape of something with the pencil and ink.

above: Henry Moore drawings

Anthony McCall exhibition at Hepworth Wakefield, 2018

I visited this exhibition in June 2018 and probably like most people, I hadn’t heard of Anthony McCall. However I was amazed by the quality of his work that was made in the 1970s onwards. There was a probing, a desire to explore within his work but at the same time a great discipline to dedicate his study to one particular area. There was a large amount of his sketch books on display and I really enjoyed looking at them. McCall uses light to create sculptures. This is presented as an installation that is dark and smokey. Its fascinating how he actually works out the sequences using drawings.

above: Anthony McCall\s sketch books

above: Anthony McCall’s light installation at Hepworth Wakefield

Guiseppe Penone at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, 2018

I was familiar with Penone’s work, but only in a loose kind of way. So I was excited to find out that Yorkshire Sculpture Park were hosting a major show of his work. I observed and noticed many things about his work. It was clear to see that drawing was import to him. However his drawings weren’t just observations of a subject (in fact there wasn’t any of those type of drawings), he was actually exploring drawing and finding interesting and new ways how to incorporate it into his practice. On a large wall he placed a thumb print of his own thumb. Around this he drew around it and then again and again until the whole wall was full. This was emulating the way rings of a tree grow. So I thought it was a clever way to take the practice of drawing and give it a degree of personalisation. Penone also uses materials to draw, such as coal, marble and tree branches.

above: Giuseppe Penone’s work at Yorkshire Sculpture Park

Larroque Arts Festival (LAF) 2018: Martin Puelen (NL), Elina Prokharava (Belarus), Arron Ross (Scot)

In the summer, I attended LAF again. The first year I went I had my sketch book with me and managed to do some drawing. However this year I didn’t seem to find the time. However there were artists there who were drawing almost on a daily basis. This seemed to me like a good idea and how to keep on top of what may well be a ‘perishable’ skill. I perhaps found out how much my skills had drifted away when I attempted to do some portraits of people. They weren’t too bad, but it would clear how out of practice I was. So in essence, seeing others drawing and painting on a daily basis reminded me of it’s benefits

above: page from the sketch book of Marten Puelen

Rachel McManus

Finally, when it comes to drawing the skills and oeuvre of cohort member Rachel McManus can’t be overlooked. Perhaps the most prolific drawer of all the class members, Rachel seems to be constantly churning out remarkable sketches of people and crowd scenes. They are very inspiring.