Faculty Show:
Selections from the International Drawing Annual 5
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Karen Hackenmiller. Liminal Interplay #1 (2009). Etching, 18x12 in. Photo Courtesy of Manifest Gallery.
Karen Hackenmiller. Liminal Interplay #1 (2009). Etching, 18x12 in. Photo Courtesy of Manifest Gallery.
In the past decade or so, drawing has witnessed a remarkable resurgence in public interest. 2003's Drawing Now show at MoMA, the 2005 publication of Vitamin D: New Perspectives in Drawing and the Boston Center for the Arts Drawing Show, just to name a few, all attest to drawing's enduring quality to fixate our imagination.
For much of the last one hundred years drawing has been viewed by the art world primarily through a lens of research and process; a view that sees drawing as a means to an end rather than an end unto itself. 20th century drawing in particular has been described by artist Richard Serra as having the character of a verb. Laura Hoptman, curator of 2003's Drawing Now, contends that as opposed to Serra's view, drawing in the 21st century has repositioned itself firmly as noun. Contemporary drawing, in her view, is now more in line with the approach of artists to the medium prior to the advent of modernism. Hoptman's assertion is not an airtight argument, but provides a useful framework for which to consider the fluctuating relationship of drawing to contemporary art. Weighing into this new/old appreciation of drawing as creative pursuit is Manifest Gallery's International Drawing Annual (INDA).
Now in its 5th incarnation, the INDA is juried show in print that presents the viewer with a yearly snapshot of currents in drawing on a global scale. 114 works by 72 artists from 11 countries attest to the continued interest in, and appetite for, drawing in contemporary art. Culled from the 72 selectees are nine artists whose work is now on display as Selections from the INDA 5. Not necessarily a "best of the best"; Selections is a subjectively assembled sample group, brought together so that, as curator Jason Franz describes, the show "exhibit(s) like a work of art, where all the parts have to be more than their sum".
For those seeking a diversity of attitude towards drawing, visitors to Manifest are likely to feel a measure of dissatisfaction. Selections is not a bold expedition into new territories of contemporary practice; much of the work on view takes little formal risk. Manifest's Selections are for the most part conservative, safe, acceptable approaches to drawing as a noun, with an emphasis on technique and representation. Of the nine works on display, only three might be considered abstract, and of those only two, Karla Hackenmiller 's Liminal Interplay and Sara Schneckloth's Confluence I, get anywhere near non objective.
As with any show of this type, not all of the works presented are worth serious consideration as art in the highest sense. Judy Dethmers' Today Is Not That Day and Michael Reedy's She Knows How to Use Them are clearly both works of great skill and dexterity, and that their photorealism is so convincing is truly a testament to their abilities as draftsmen. But that's all these works are: a testament to technique. Dethmers' Today Is Not That Day, a portrait of an elderly woman, vacillates between conceptual inertness and movie of the week sentimentality. Reedy's She Knows How to Use Them in particular is so rife with juvenile allusions it's difficult to see it as anything other than masturbation in mixed media.
Matthew Woodward. Seventh and Perry II (2009). Graphite on paper, 120x55 in. Photo Courtesy of Manifest Gallery.
Matthew Woodward's Seventh and Perry II, among the largest, and one of the few abstract images on display suggests location (an intersection of two streets?) and this notion is reinforced by imagery which is evocative of architectural ornament. A concentration of organic forms on the order of those found on long forgotten 18th century buildings, or the decaying remnants of classical structures, simultaneously emerge from, and are subsumed into, a gestural, ethereal space. As ambitious as this work is in terms of scale, Seventh and Perry II loses some of its guts under intense scrutiny. Ultimately there just isn't enough in the work to hold the viewer's attention for an extended period of time.
Similarly, the drawings of Sonya Berg, Charles Kanwischer, and Brett Ebberhardt form a triumvirate of modestly sized, competently executed representational drawings that provoke little more than indifference after a period of several minutes. It's not that any of these images are necessarily bad; in fact all of the works in Selections display a great deal of technical proficiency. It's just that in an age where photo reproduction has reached maximum saturation, the ability to render something in a near photographic manner is simply not enough.
The stand out drawing in Manifest's Selections is undoubtedly Joseph Miller's charcoal masterpiece Flood. This piece alone is worth the making the trip to the gallery. Miller's Flood is so palpably better than any of its contemporaries in the parallel space that it is difficult to pull away from it in order to give the other works consideration. Unlike Dethmers and Reedy, Miller's Flood is about far more than the virtuosic handling of media, but it is that as well. Flood recalls the warm, delicate conte drawings of Seurat that were on display last year at MoMA. Miller's work is not so much rendered as it is conjured up on the page; it is as if Flood had appeared fully formed on the surface without the need for the artist as intermediary. The figures in Miller's Flood emerge out of an ambiguous space of light and atmosphere that is without time and location. Only the seemingly anachronistic digital camera in the hand of the central figure differentiates Flood from a work that could have been executed 130 years ago. And that's a good thing. Miller's composition has a quality of timelessness and a sense of significant form that most of the best art has. Miller's drawing is permeated with a vitality that only one with a deep sensitivity to the demands of the art form can muster.
Joseph Miller. Miller (2009). Charcoal, 20.75x20.5 in. Photo Courtesy of Manifest Gallery.
Manifest Gallery's Selection's from the INDA 5 is admittedly a subjective interpretation of an exhibition that exists primarily in print form; and it's difficult not to see the curator's bias towards technique and representational imagery. Additionally, allowances must be made for the fact that not all of the work featured in the print edition of the INDA can be shown in the gallery; some pieces may not be available, and some pieces may not be able to be physically shipped half a world away. These are all permissible rationales for explaining why the show is constructed as such. As it is, one may still hope that next year's Selections might feature a few more works that challenge the viewer's expectations of drawing; both as a noun and a verb.
