new work: Society of 23 Symbol Drawings
The other day I uploaded documentation of pencil drawings for the Society of 23. Here’s an explanation of the pencil drawings that is on the Society of 23 website:
During the initiation process into the Society of 23, each brother takes a spiritual journey where he encounters the seven symbols of the society: 23, 2 Crowns, Fire, Grapes, Rice, The Scales, and Wings. When he returns from his trip, he is placed in a pitch-black room where he sketches the symbols he has seen.
If you head on over to the Society of 23 website, you can navigate from the homepage, to the Brothers page, and then click on any brother’s picture to learn more about him. On each page you will see a thumbnail above the brother’s name, as seen here:
When you click on that thumbnail, a slideshow will appear that presents the seven drawings he made during the initiation process. Here’s a peek at Andrew Ethan’s Grapes drawing:
And here’s a peek at Joseph Dylan’s Fire drawing:
I had a wild time creating these drawings. I’ve mentioned before that I have a lot of anxiety about drawing because I feel like it’s a technical skill I can’t quite get the hang of. My freshman year drawing professor, Lance Winn, changed my entire mode of drawing and I can say with confidence that I have some great skill at realism with graphite and pastel. But when it comes to line drawings with pencil, there’s something loss in translation from my eyes to brain to hand to paper. Sketching is like the absolute worst way for me get an idea out of my head—my ideas are almost always spewed out through writing.
So what was the problem and how did I solve it? Well the problem was: Each brother must draw 7 drawings. 7 drawings x 23 brothers. Solution: Blindfold myself! Yes, that’s right, I blindfolded myself:
While the mythology of the society’s initiation is still being worked out, I know that the brothers go on a spiritual journey that may or may not be drug induced. On this trip they encounter advisers, demons, past memories, and the symbols of the Society of 23. When they return from the trip, they automatically scribble the symbols onto paper in a pitch-black room. To mimic that situation, I blindfolded myself (no drugs!). When I first thought of this project, I really saw a similarity to Matthew Barney’s Drawing Restraint, where he constructed large apparatuses that then restrained his movement in some way while he attempted to draw a self-portrait:
The results looked like manic, childlike scribbles:
So go on and check out all the drawings at the Society of 23 website. I’m going to incorporate the drawings in a lot of installation and photographic work. It’s an element of this crazy world that is finally finished. Hurray!
