Bailin Studio

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Drawing Conclusions

The Studio is not my Friend

October 2014

I open the door…

The Studio is not my friend. I open the door to my studio like Kafka's K opens doors in The Trial. Stacks of papers, newspaper clippings, sketches, and notes, walls outlined by paint where paper had been stapled and its surface prepared for drawing, tables and chairs covered with layers of charcoal, pastel and dust, the surface of which disturbed by hand, arm or foot prints, and a labyrinth of boxes and tools to sort through. In open sketchbooks I discover ink spots covering intense sketches and slow, meandering and meaningless lines drawn over intense thumbnails as evidence I had fallen asleep and where, without missing a beat, unconsciously, continued to hack out a beginning. To begin the work means deciphering its beginnings. I wonder if I only think make progress on a drawing but in fact I am only trying to find its beginnings.

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Bailin portrait