Drawing on new talent

The people behind Jugglers ArtSpace Inc recently held the Marie Ellis OAM Prize for Drawing.

I was, as I'm sure many were, extremely excited about this exhibition. Finally some attention to drawing! I feel that drawing is deeply unappreciated and somewhat neglected in today's world of art. It seems to be lumped into categories like cartooning, animation and graphic design- all of which can be fantastic- however, not often enough is drawing acknowledged as exhibition worthy.

Drawing was first seen as an art in its own right way back in the Renaissance period, shortly after Leo da Vinci passed away, a fascination for his sketches took place. Yes, they were most likely intended as a preparatory base for his paintings, but people began to recognise a beauty in sketches. Whether basic or detailed, there always seems to be an element of simplicity to drawing. An etching of a feeling or thought can represent and mean so many things all at once. For me, drawing stirs up emotions unlike any other medium. Now perhaps this is the result of my childhood obsession with picture books and illustrations of fantasy worlds, nonetheless, there is something undeniably special about drawing. The uniqueness of an unfinished image opens up a whole new perspective, evoking ideas within the viewer, rather than just expressing the ideas of the artist. An essential element of drawing is the space encompassed within the image. Space and lightless surrounding ink allows it to breathe and allows our thoughts and imaginations to drift. This is the power of drawing and illustration, works are -to a degree- open to interpretation.

Varying in style and mediums artists were encouraged to create their works the old fashioned way: by putting pen to paper. (or charcoal/pencil/pastel etc to canvas/wood panel etc...) and, the results were truly breathtaking.




-Greg Grienke MAJOR PRIZE WINNER

View Jugglers Facebook page for the 26 completely unique Finalist Entries