threshold series 1

Threshold Series 1
Developing Drawings / Drawings in Transition 2008 - 2015

The historical thread that runs through these drawings can be traced back
to six square paintings made in 1999 (see 'paintings' Thresholds 1 -6). The
arrangement of vertical and horizontal lines within the paintings, referred to
a specific interior door. A room behind this door projected a line of light across
the floor, and established a clear 'threshold' between the observed space and
imagined space beyond.

It was not until 2008, that a group of drawings, centred on a square format,
began to emerge. Using the door as a motif and metaphor to illustrate an
entrance or barrier to another place, and retaining the notion of a threshold
as a pivotal line to cross; became the two central templates that define the
drawings identity.

The drawings are architectural in that they involve space and the relationship
between spaces/levels, but have an uncertain dialogue with the issue of scale.
The strict rules of technical drawing are set aside, as the aim here is with
establishing an 'emotional space' and not a physical one. Their ambiguity of
positive/negative, solid/empty, encourage that they be read as 'plan' or 'section',
or even a fusion of both. Lines and marks that enter a zone beyond the central
drawing, direct and change the boundaries of the work (rejecting the
conventional rectangle of paper), altering the compositions anatomy, and
in turn transfering the drawing to the realm of 'object'.

The use of the square is constant, sometimes hidden within the composition,
sometimes multiplied by two or three; but the drawing always starts from a
singular square, with the ability to extend itself in any direction. Also throughout
the series, crosshatching is used partly as a layering device, but is mainly a method
of acquiring territory within the drawing.

It is easier to give drawing measurments by the initial starting square of the
compositions, which are either 6cm or 4.5cm. The pens are 0.1 and 005 and
are permanent archive ink on cartridge paper.