Process

the students spent a day in groups on a data collection and synthesis mission

how does one get into town by train? what is the hydrology of the area?

they researched and made maps by tracing elements onto tracing paper, photographing them and bringing them into Illustrator as layers

the information was then democratically shared by all to inform plans that used and transformed what was already present

the room when one walked in was warm and had a low buzzing sound

the body language was collective and collaborative

a creative engine

students told me about how some people stay in the studio at school together instead of going home to work in order to draw on that energy of the shared space

artists set up shared work spaces too and do it in cafes, but institutions for art not set up by artists themselves, i'm afraid still have Jackson Pollack in his barn in mind as a modernist model

the Penn students made draft proposals earlier in January

as well as having spent a lot of time researching the place from afar and making amazing graphics that communicated about travel patterns, local flora and fauna, geology etc...

the segments of proposals above play with reconstituting a border in a new way

i found that the most powerful works transcended purpose and bled into metaphor

the most powerful imagined landscapes for me were the ones that became poems

one above used seasonal patterns of water rise and fall to make a bridge across the border appear and disappear

Laurie and Hallie drawing in the field

drawing, like photographing consciously, is about learning to see