The Quarantine Series
While life during a pandemic felt precarious, one thing was certain: each day I sat down and scratched ink into painted pieces of wood. The Quarantine Series confronts the anxiety, isolation, and uncertainty brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. To represent our collective anxiety and my personal experience with it, I painted acrylic onto salvaged plywood in a gestural, expressive and intuitive process. I then drew an intricate and overlapping grid on the dried paint. The grid, in effect, makes the artistic decisions in advance, so the only task each day was to sit down, dip into ink, and draw lines. The thousands of lines I drew every day tally the passage of time and are a growing record of my ongoing efforts to manage my anxiety and uncertainty during the lockdowns. With each piece named after the month of the pandemic in which it was created, The Quarantine Series chronicles the ever-changing landscape of anxiety. The daily ritual of focusing narrowly on the next line I drew allowed me to control what I can control and appreciate the things that are certain.
Longtime Vaccine, acrylic paint, resin, pencil, and ink on canvas, 30” x 42”, February 2021
January I, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, and ink on plywood, 15”x 20”, January 2021
December III, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, and ink on plywood, 9.5” x 23”, December 2020
December II, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, and ink on plywood, 11” x 18.5”, December 2020
December I, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, and ink on plywood, 10” x 22.5”, December 2020
November II, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, and ink on plywood, 16.5” x 26” , November 2020
November I, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, and ink on wood, 17” x 27”, November 2020
October II, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, and ink on plywood, 16” x 32”, October 2020
October I, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 16” x 26”, October 2020
September III, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 10.5” x 85”, September 2020
September II, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 11” x 48”, September 2020
September I, acrylic paint, latex acrylic, pencil, and and ink on plywood, 11” x 33”, September 2020
August, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 36” x 48”, August 2020
June and July, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 48” x 48”, June-July 2020
May II, acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 16” x 25”, May 2020
May I, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 16” x 25”, May 2020
April II, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 20” x 60”, April 2020
April I, acrylic paint, latex acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 16” x 25”, April 2020
March II, acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on plywood, 8” x 20.5”, March 2020
March I, acrylic paint, pencil and ink on plywood, 10” x 10”, March 2020
Alone Together, acrylic paint, ink, and glue on cardboard, and acrylic paint, pencil, and ink on wood, ~19” x 33”, March 2020
To read about Alone Together and its connection to The Quarantine Series, click here.