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| A Line Mad by Walking by Richard Long. 1967 |
A passage questioning drawing as a work on paper:
What a drawing is should be defined more by the activity that initiates it rather than by the material it leaves traces on. Quite apart from the fact that the Museum of Modern Art's definition expels those drawings at Cornith and at Lascaux, it banishes many of the works that, be they on walls, objects, the ground, or in the air, have been pre-eminent in extending drawing's current status and meaning. (A less restrictive working definition could be: 'A group of related marks, probably linear, left by an object or objects touching a surface; the surface itself will normally remain partially visible around these marks. Such a combination of marks and surface will seem to intimate some meaning.') Tony Godfrey. Drawing Today, p. 12. 1990.
The author goes on to say that the works of Richard Long (
Line made by Walking) and Robert Smithson (
Spiral Jetty) are just as important to the practice of drawing as any works made on paper with traditional drawing materials.
I believe there is some truth in this statement, and I believe those are quality examples, but does this perspective overlook the fundamental nature of drawing? Does this viewpoint ignore the fact that drawings are a point of examination before further movement, where thoughts are being exhumed and mulled over, trying to reach some terms of understanding? Did Smithson and Long in fact make drawings for these projects before the final works were created?
There is much to think about.
Further on in the chapter the author goes on to state:
If drawing is like a language . . . it is more like a body-language, than written or spoken language. Alternatively, rather than seeing drawing as language, we should see it as the residue of an activity, perhaps similar to the footprints that a dancer would leave in the sand, or perhaps similar to the rucks and coruscations left in the beach by the receding sea. These marks may not be intentionally meaningful, they may not use a 'language', but they will reveal patterns, relationships, even a satisfying coherence. Tony Godfrey. Drawing Today, p. 17. 1990.
This is more in line with my perspective on drawing, though I have a more equal focus on intentional and unintentional. Again in respect to drawings existing outside of the standard formats, I am unsure of my level of agreement with the author. Using language as an example, is there not a difference between the written word and the spoken word? Can a written word be separated from the confinements of the page? I find it funny that the author makes this division in respect to written and spoken language, but is able to have the language of drawing cross many boundaries and formats. In a way I want to say he is totally off-base, but in a way he is correct. Transcendence is possible in all forms of language. The question for me is once a language escapes the confinements of its format is it able to retain its designation as such? Why can I not simply refer to Long's
Line Made by Walking as a performance informed by drawing instead of saying it
is a drawing.
At the end of the day this reading is faulty, as all arguments have to be, but it does offer up some interesting thoughts on drawing. Even though this book is over 20 years old it seems that many of the arguments it brings up in terms of drawing have remained unanswered and as a result this is still a relevant read. There are many possible reasons for this, perhaps the late 80's to early 90's were a good time for drawing with the likes of Donald Sultan, Joel Shapiro, Robert Morris and the like producing strong work examining the nature of the medium. The post-studio art of the 70's had lost some of its shine and these sorts of visual based questionings were able to move back in for a while. And perhaps this was short lived because those artists of the 70's started teaching and churning out students with similar concerns as theirs and therefore reinvigorating the art market with their particular kind of beautyless presence causing drawing to yet again take a backseat only to be truly examined in fields outside of the fine arts. A lot of what we see in drawing exhibitions and catalogues today are informed by graphic/comic art, illustration, architectural, technical, and geographic drawings, and if they are informed by the fine arts it is usually from a post-modern perspective filled with high levels of irony or post-irony or post-post-irony. This is troublesome as drawing can be the most honest of all art forms. It can be the embryonic state where possibilities are endless and desired but yet not really formed. I think this is the 'immediacy' everyone refers to when they talk about drawing, the unformed potential, which is a feeling or state that every human being experiences regardless of their concerns or directions in life. So maybe the interest in deeply examining drawing and what it means began to wane in the mid 90's and that is the reason the quality of discourse on the subject, as well how it is being examined by current artists and curators, has, if anything, regressed. Yet, there is a small chance, as it seems that essays, books, and exhibits devoted to solely drawing do seem to pop up from time to time, though infrequently, it is the nature of drawing, as an ambivalent and not fully knowable process, that lends itself to constant reexamination.
Again, there is much to think about.
