New Project, drawings this time

Lately i haven't been able to find new collage sources. I have looked at my current stash of materials way too often; i am finding it difficult to make connections that  all of the disparate image bits gel into an artful composition. So, time to put it away for awhile in hopes of a re-awakening in the future.

last collage for awhile Blue Study #1, for my friends Brian and Marianne

As is my want when i am stumped for inspiration i have turned to my own special brand of zen doodling. I have always enjoyed drawing, although realism doesn't often rock my boat.

I decided to work on an extended drawing project, which features small, daily zen tangle drawing, which when completed i would turn into a small accordion style book.

The project starts with a 17 x 24" piece of Canson multi-media paper, which i folded using a traditional origami 8 fold. This resulted in 32 panels, 16 per side of 3.5 x 4.25" each.

side 1, folded and blind gesture

I did a quick, blind gesture drawing on each side. The line of the gesture drawing provide an isolated, yet related line to start each daily drawing practice with.

side 2, folded and blind gesture

I am calling this project The Exquisite Corpse, after the Dada automatic writing game of the same name. If you are not familiar, the basis of the game is the creation of a story by a group of people who have no idea of what has been written prior.(The folded paper).

side 1, 2/16 panels complete

So my thrust here is the exploration of how i can create an harmonious composition out of a group of individual drawings which are made without knowledge of the others.

I made a mask to keep myself from visually working off of either the completed panels of the drawing, or the gesture lines of the adjacent panels. My theory here is that the lines of the gesture drawing will provide enough balance and unity  to the composition  to create a pleasing end product, regardless of the differences in texture and lines of the individual panels.

Side two, 3/16 panels complete

I have four panels done on each side and am starting to see the development of an unified composition, Hooray!

Side 1, 4/16 panels complete

My intention was to only complete one panel a day, which would mean that this would take a little over a month to complete. I have gotten so into the project that i find myself usually doing two a day!

More updates on this project in a bit.

See ya soon

gail