Question 1

regarding drawing

S.W:

Stephen Carley describes drawing as 'a form of collating, remembering, archiving, information gathering.' What is drawing for you?

R.K:

Drawing is a lot of different things to me.. (and a lot of things besides!)

The sketch ..the quick recording of an idea, for sure, but I have never really been a 'sketch book artist'. I tend to write about my ideas in notebooks, and a quick drawing might be needed, but really only a doodle...having said that.. I do quite a lot of doodling!

As I'm now mostly painting from life....I use drawing as a way of 'getting to know' the object/pebble I'm going to paint (Stephen's definition in a way?).... But when is a sketch a step towards something else ?.. and when is it a work in it's own right?? (an issue that kind of separates modern art from the classical, traditional 'method'... probably starting with Cezanne who (maybe seen in retrospect) elevated the 'sketch' to a work in it's own right … he also had some pretty weird, and contradicting ideas about drawing!)

But when I'm doing relatively quick drawings of the object I intend to paint in order to 'get to grips' with the shape and structure.... I think this makes my approach to painting quite traditional. I do value those drawings too though...as they 'express' something that the painting can't.

Drawing is also a separate, and entirely self-contained expression for me. In a way I paint what I can't express in drawing, and draw what I don't feel I can properly achieve in painting. My paintings are observational, and my 'graphic novel format' drawings are born out of a totally different culture/genre, and set of ideas.

I spent years trying to 'combine drawing and painting'.. and I'm not even quite sure what that really means anymore (only that I was never happy with the results) ... I think good painting depends on good drawing, but my drawing is not dependent on my painting... only in that one can't substitute the other, and both feed of each other.