Lectures
Deanna Petherbridge – The Primacy of Drawing
Deanna Petherbridge is an artist, writer and curator primarily concerned with drawing. Her recent book The Primacy of Drawing: Histories and Theories of Practice is about the direct experience of artists, the historical role of drawing and its relationship to the sciences.
From the publisher’s website:
This important and original book affirms the significance of drawing as visual thinking in western art from the fifteenth century to the present through an examination of its practice: how and why it is made, how it relates to other forms of visual production and theories of art, and what artists themselves have written about it. The author herself is a practicing artist, and through scrutinizing a wide range of drawings in various media, she confirms a long historical commitment to the primal importance of sketching in generating ideas and problem solving, examines the production of autonomous drawings as gifts or for pleasure, and traces the importance of the life-class and theories of drawing in the training of artists until well into the twentieth century.In the final chapters she address the changing role of drawing in relation to contemporary practice, and its importance for conceptual artists working in a non-hierarchical manner with a multiplicity of practices, techniques and technologies.Quoting the writings of artists from Vasari to Reynolds, Delacroix to Ruskin, Klee and Kandinsky to Beuys, Petherbridge proposes that drawing constitutes a discrete, if engaged, discourse within visual practice, with its own internal economy, its own typologies, codes, systems, materials and strategies of making; its own markets and collectors, its own power relations and self-representations. As well as analyzing specific works by great draughtsmen such as Leonardo, Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Goya and Picasso, close attention is paid to those artists traditionally regarded as ‘minor’ because of their graphic elaboration or involvement with caricature and play, as well as to the important contribution of women artists in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.The book is a response to the vibrant rediscovery of drawing as significant practice in studios, exhibitions and art schools, and proposes an ambitious and novel agenda for the study and enjoyment of drawing.
Deanna Petherbridge is giving a series of talks around Australia.
You can also download audio from an interview she gave on the Radio National program Artworks – http://www.abc.net.au/rn/artworks/stories/2011/3147614.htm
Tuesday March 1, 12.30 to 1.30 pm Michelangelo and Mickey Mouse: Drawing Now, Cell block theatre, The National Art School, Sydney – http://www.nas.edu.au/news/whats-on
Saturday March 5, 2pm, Gallery talk in exhibition Freehand: Recent Australian Drawing, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne – http://www.heide.com.au/whats_on/events.php?event=1540
Monday March 7, 6 pm, Book Launch, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne – http://melbourneartnetwork.com.au/2011/02/11/lecture-the-primacy-of-drawing/
Thursday March 10, 1pm, Art forum lecture, ANU School of Art, Canberra – http://soa.anu.edu.au/art-forum
For more details or bookings for any of these events please contact the institution where it is being held. See Deanna Petherbridge’s website for further information on her publications – http://www.deannapetherbridge.com
Dear Deanna
It was with the greatest interest and intensity that I listened to your Radio National interveiw a moment ago (recorded back in March this year).
I savoured every word you spoke…you express the feelings that i also have about the drawing process. I was trained as a Printmaker back in the late 70s, but drawing has always been my passion. Marks and the expressive use of line excite me so, as I feel they do for you!
It’s particularly uplifting to have Drawing validated within the Visual Arts arena as a practice in itself.Currently i teach adults Life Drawing (inspired often by the German Expressionists)from my home studio…as a way of income, but I feel the urge to push much further than this in my own practice. I’m on a threashold of sorts, and hope to explore drawing at a more conceptual level. I will certainly buy your book!