Drawn/Taped/Burned: Abstraction on Paper » Tristan Perich

Tristan Perich, Machine Wall Drawing

Rachel Nackman — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 20:54:27 +0000

Tristan Perich: Machine Wall Drawing (Katonah Museum, 2011)

Christine Hiebert on Tristan Perich

Rachel Nackman — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:12:18 +0000

Is this drawing an alibi for
what the artist was doing
between 1:11 and 4:32pm?
It draws us close; we’re willing to listen.
Even as the markings are decoy:
etched by code-driven stylus —
switched on, later off.
Perhaps forensics will find fingerprints
in the soft white of the paper,
handled with uncharted frequency
on forgotten days.

Tristan Perich on Edda Renouf

Rachel Nackman — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 15:54:55 +0000

Like the haze from 42 meteors, Renouf’s marks capture both the essence of an action and the separate but related flurry of activity around it. Our laws of physics tend to rip things apart over time, from rusting metal and organic decomposition to the large-scale expansion of our universe. A drop of color dilutes in water because Brownian motion pulls its molecules hither and thither until its hue is averaged with its environment. But in Renouf’s Incisions, dilution isn’t just a byproduct of a physical process. Curving slightly to the left or wisping downwards, her marks capture a deliberate process, reflecting some pattern within her creative mind. They abstract the relationship between an object and its effect through repeated iteration. Suspended without motion since 1975, her marks and their haze are as timeless as these meteors in space.