Transcendental Escapism » Drawings

RiverLit Magazine

David Mazure — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 12:07:06 +0000

The new issue (#5) of RiverLit Magazine is out and my artwork is on the back cover. Check it out here. The front cover is pictured below.

The Infinite Possibility of All Things by Elly Ruslan

Innovations

David Mazure — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 12:07:00 +0000

Of all of the juried shows that I have had my artwork shown in these past few years, I am most excited about this show: ‘Innovations’ at the Dowd Gallery of SUNY Cortland in Cortland, NY (the show runs from January 18th – March 2nd, 2012). The work accepted in this show “represents innovations in concept, subject or media use” — which is one of my main objectives in creating any piece of art. Both of the pieces I submitted were accepted to the exhibition [pictured below] and I will be venturing up to SUNY Cortland’s Dowd Gallery to present an Artist Talk/Lecture and/or a Workshop for the students at SUNY Cortland sometime in the first week or two of February 2012. Please read the written statement that I submitted for ‘Innovations’ here.

The first work that has been accepted to ‘Innovations’ is a digital print intervention titled: Mapping the Probability of Archetypical Configurations of Elementary Particles in Thought-Space and will appear in Bowers Hall (the science building) on the campus of SUNY Cortland.

In case you are interested in some of the jargon on this poster, here are some details:

The other piece that was accepted is Transmeanderation Helix (Parts 1, 2 & 3) and will be installed in the Dowd Gallery. Here is Transmeanderation Helix as it appeared at the William King Museum in 2010:

Siena Art Institute’s ‘Drawing Connections’

David Mazure — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 12:07:36 +0000

I am happy to announce that the work you see below will appear at the Siena Art Institute’s Grand Opening exhibition, titled ‘Drawing Connections’, which will open this September 24th, in Siena, Italy. So, if you happen to been in or around Siena toward the end of September or during the month of October I highly recommend that you pop in for a visit!

The exhibition’s theme is (as the title suggests) based on drawing. . . “bringing artists from all over the world together to celebrate the act of drawing on a postcard sized work. [They are] looking for original drawings or other artworks that celebrate the act of drawing (understanding that the act of drawing can also be celebrated in a variety of media outside of traditional drawing materials such as graphite and charcoal.”

Closer toward the opening of the exhibition there will be a downloadable catalog displaying all of the artists’ work that will appear in the exhibition. I will post a link as soon as the catalog is on-line.

And this is what they look like when displayed side-by-side:

Entanglement P6 (A, B, & C) • ink & marker • 15cm x 10.5cm (each) • 2011

Unfinished Projects Part 3

David Mazure — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 12:07:33 +0000

Welcome to Part 3 of the Unfinished Project series, the final installment. Pictured below are four projects that I worked on that haven’t been used for anything and haven’t been shown in any gallery for any reason. Once again, it is quite a shame because I spent much time and energy on these projects (oh, ‘woe is me’) but they just weren’t up to par.

This first project was originally submitted for an international juried exhibition (in the UK) and was not accepted. The full title for the piece is: If a quark blinked into existence and then immediately blinked out of existence right before your eyes, this is not what it would look like. Back to the drawing board.

Back to the Drawing Board • inkjet Print, vinyl prints • 2011

The next (rather large) drawing was completed in 2007:

Thought-Organ: Wisdom • 78″w x 30″h • graphite, ink wash • 2007

The next image is a digital mock-up of a several drawings that I combined to then create an intaglio print from. I did create a print from it but it came out really bad. Unfortunately, I do not have any images of the failed print. The title suggests a ‘divining of oblivion’ — a topic that still pervades my work.

Oblivination • Ink, pencil, digital • 2006

And, the final pieces below are simply interesting croppings of another large-scale drawing (probably about 6-8 feet long) titled Thought-Organ: Love that I never exhibited.

Taken from Thought-Organ: Love • Digital & Graphite • 2007

Thought-Organ: Love (The End) • Graphite • 2007

Unfinished Projects Part 2: Collected Subconscious

David Mazure — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 12:07:43 +0000

Welcome to Part 2 of the Unfinished Projects series. The piece I would like to discuss today was originally conceived in late 2007 (while I was still working toward my MFA) and is titled Collected Subconscious. At this time I was looking at the automatic drawings of Austin Spare, as well as, the Surrealists. I think there are some really interesting conceptual ideas happening here and an interesting use of light and shadow in a work of art, but, overall it was lacking in several areas and that’s why it got benched. Maybe I’ll revisit this concept in the future. Who knows?

A much more ambitious alternate arrangement.

A sample conscious/subconscious line drawing on plexi-glas.

When searching for images for the Unfinished Project series I came across the image below. I have no idea what it was intended for. All I know is that I spent a great deal of time on it and I never used it for anything!

Unfinished Projects Part 1: NFC/Entanglement

David Mazure — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 12:07:35 +0000

This post begins with Part 1 in a three-part series of Unfinished Projects. You can see some previous posts of unfinished projects that will not be appearing in this series here and here. Nothing is more frustrating than spending over 100 hours of work on a project that doesn’t get completed. Such is the case with the project below, titled Not for Consumption/Entanglement, that I began in mid-February of this year and just decided to shelf (for now) a week ago. I was just speaking with a scientist the other day who thought that his field was the only one in which hours and hours of work could go into a project that goes nowhere — but, working in a university environment, I am discovering more and more connections between the arts and sciences every day.
This summer I have been focusing on how to not only create the imagery I want, but to also to create work whose final presentation is of much higher quality than I have presented in the past. Unfortunately, I just could not work out all of the material issues associated with this project to reach that goal, for many different reasons; the top two were 1) money (and I could not foresee getting grant money to fund this specific project) and 2) my studio is way too wet and has ruined most of my paper and makes it very difficult to apply any type of media to paper.
Without further ado, here are some images from Not for Consumption/Entanglement:

Above is the original digital sketch for the project. Hours were spent on creating a composition adhering to the measurements of the Golden Section spiral while also adhering to some sense of rabatment. Each rectangle in the grid is a 14″h x 17″w ink, marker, and color pencil drawing that was to be dry mounted onto a durable backing. The dark, vertical strip on the fourth row was to be covered with tinted plexi-glas with white vinyl (for the symbol) adhered to the front of the plexi. Horizontal rows three and four were to be vinyl prints adhered directly to the wall (more of that below).

Some 14″ x 17″ ink drawings for the upper quadrant of the project (horribly warped due to moisture).

Some 14″ x 17″ ink, graphite, color pencil, ink wash and marker drawings (again with some moisture warping).

Twelve 14″ x 17″ linear ink drawings of horizontal rows three and four (and part of row five), which were then intended to be redrawn digitally in Illustrator.

Whatever happens with this project in the future, I don’t really know. But, I DO know that I really dig this composition and may use it for another (smaller scale) drawing and/or for a mural project (if one should ever present itself).

Another composition I’m particularly fond of. There are about twelve other pencil drawings associated with the project that aren’t shown here.

Stay tuned for Part 2 of Unfinished Projects: Collected Subconscious

VAE: Pulp

David Mazure — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 12:07:28 +0000

If you happen to be in North Carolina this month from July 1st – 28th, come check out Pulp in the Main Gallery at VAE (Visual Art Exchange), in Raleigh, where two of my unframed sketches for larger projects will be on exhibit. I am pretty excited about this show because these two specific drawings have never been displayed anywhere before. I also like the fact that this show is fairly informal, stressing the unframed nature of the work (which also makes it easier to ship!) The guidelines for the show were pretty simple: “Unframed works on paper. Artist books, sketchbooks & 3D works welcome. Size requirements for 2D works: 20×30 inches (standard sized drawing paper) minimum, 72 inches maximum.”

Study for Transmeanderation • Ink on translucent butcher paper • 24″ x 18″ • 2009

Preliminary Sketch for Habakkuk • Graphite • 32″ x 48″ • 2010

Grubby paws, measly mitts, and metacarpal mélange

David Mazure — Tue, 17 May 2011 12:07:04 +0000

The summer has begun and I will soon (very soon) get back to creating art other than hands! Currently, I’m in the process of finishing up some ‘end-of-the-school-year’ business, and once that is done, I promise to have some other posts besides my hand-a-day drawings. But, for the time being, please enjoy this edition of hand drawings, titled: “Grubby Paws, Measly Mitts and Metacarpal Mélange”:

Gotta hand it to you. . .

David Mazure — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 12:07:25 +0000

And, more hands. . .

Year of the Hand

David Mazure — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 12:07:49 +0000

A few weeks ago, as a warm-up exercise in my Basic Drawing class, I had my class draw their own hand. I explained to them that the hand was a very difficult thing to draw and that if you master the art of drawing the hand then you are well on your way to being able to master drawing the human body. I also explained that it is a handy (get it?) object to have around because your hand will always be there and you can draw it any time, any place and you can never say that you don’t have something interesting and challenging to draw.
So, I’ve decided to take my own advice. I have officially embarked upon a year long venture of drawing a hand-a-day. I began this project on February 18th, 2011 – so hopefully by February 18th, 2012 I will have a few sketchbooks filled with at least 365 hand drawings! Below are a few of my more successful studies in the past month. The media range from graphite, to ink, to marker, to color pencil. Click on the image for a closer view: