DRAWING OUTSIDE THE BOUNDARY OF FORM

Have you ever tried to visualize what a form looks like before it is resolved? Is there a plasmic, free flowing state of a form before it is a form? What if we draw outside the limits, the edge, the boundary, of form? What if, through our transparency, depict on our paper forms that are barely resolved?

This mode of drawing toward a holistic form, without actually resolving it, is what I call Outside The Boundary Of Form, or OBOF. I employed the mode OBOF for the drawing at the top. The source image is a rock formation that I took while on a walk in Sydney, Australia, in February. The surfaces of the rock had been eroded and colored to a spectacular degree along the seacoast.

All of the lines and tones do not contribute to a knowledge of a complete, resolved form. We might say that our drawing is in that mystic state just before there is a holistic resolution.

In this mode, we are drawing in between the Four Spacetimes. Lines that we draw might only relate to a certain part, instead of making sense within the larger context of the form. The gestural response is still alive, which keeps the possibility of form open. We want the serendipitous interplay of a free composition. We want our lines and tones to suggest the unexpected.

This enables us to move toward knowledge of form. The use of OBOF drawing are many. The boundary form drawing can serve as the foundation for subsequent iterations of Drawing From Drawing. Parts of the knowledge can be isolated and developed. Or the boundary form drawing can simply be an independent piece of our knowledge.

I have found that having OBOF as an available drawing mode is useful. We get a portal toward an interim state of knowledge. With this mode, we can indeed visualize a form before is is a form.