Line of Thought, 2014
“[Of drawing:] An active line on a walk, moving freely, without goal. A walk for a walk’s sake.”
-Paul Klee
Some people may think in straight lines but my thoughts tend to curve and meander. To me, lines have always represented movement and an exploration of space. Sometimes it is a physical space, like the implied line my body makes as it walks through and over a landscape. Sometimes it is the imaginary space of a page as my pen explores its unchartered surface.
I like to think of these drawings as mind maps, physical records of time spent circling around a particular thought. I begin a drawing by placing my pen on the empty page, the way a traveler steps into some unknown countryside for the first time. The first lines on the page appear conspicuous and isolated but, as they begin to accumulate and twist in and out of one another, complex forms appear and grow. I often find my mind wandering as I draw, seeing the lines but focusing on some idea off of the page. The physical movements mirror the movement of my mind and imagination as they find their way through the twists and turns of a new mental landscape.
Amy Gilles 