Drawn Out 2020: from the Collection

This exhibition includes a wide range of approaches where artists have completed a drawing. In some examples the work may be made up of lines, that make a shape, that tells us precisely what that shape is. Often, the way the work of art is made tells us even more about what it is “about”. This range of styles and approaches are ways of seeing, and interpreting that lead to an expanded vocabulary of what art is, and what its purposes can be.
Ask yourself, is it striking in some way, why is that, how is that? Questioning the simplicity, the directness, the complexity, energy, vastness, or isolation, leads us to conclusions made in that conveyance of ideas with images. Some tell us of a singular thought, or story, or quality that the artist conveys, and that is because of what or how they are depicting a subject or idea.

Drawing has a beginning and it also has a conclusion. What is included and excluded or the space it shows us is all part of that expression. The negative space around a shape or subject sometimes looms as large as the subject. Sometimes it is a significant part of that subject and helps to complete the picture. Taking in the decisions that artists make to complete their drawings, what they include, and how they are organized leads us to conclusions about why or how a work of art is made. Sometimes the difficult part is not having all the answers. And sometimes appreciating the work for what is there in front of us is more than enough.