formless – Dubuffet and hylography

Last year Paul Noble and I explored his remarkable world of Nobson New Town [Link]. Our conversation became [In Parenthesis] a kind of inventory or dictionary of topics in the way that form emerges in Paul’s drawing [Link] Here’s one of my initial reactions [Link]: In Nobson, buildings and structures give form to letters; things…

hylography – terra sigillata

Hylography – the process of emergence and disappearance, intentional or unintentional, of graphical form out of matter – [Link] Here in a work by Helen (Shanks). The technique is terra sigillata – employing a fine slip applied to the surface and manipulated in firing to various effect. In antiquity the results were fine and very…

theory of ruin – hylography

– the clouds take on shapes almost recognizable – the waves on the shore offer smooth gestures in the sand – the gravestone inscription weathers such that it appears to have lost all form … but not quite This is hylography – the process of emergence and disappearance, intentional or unintentional, of graphical form out…