Pastel, graphite, and colored pencil on wove paper.
Drawing #75 in the series "Concealed Faith".
Monogrammed and dated on the recto.
Signed, titled, dated, and annotated on the verso.
Drawn to the sheet edge, as usual for the artist.
Sheet size: 18 x 23 1/2 inches.
Comment about Concealed Faith, the new group of drawings by Kate Hendrickson:
It should be contradictory that Kate Hendrickson’s new
series, titled Concealed Faith, reveal intimate personal choices she had
thus far shared with few. It is not.
These drawings started to take shape in 2020. They are drawn in graphite and pastel mostly,
and they show the artists creative method with crisp transparently. In these drawings Hendrickson reveals the way
she approaches the sheet of paper, and how she uses her inspiration. Rather than hide her method in inextricable
abstraction, this new corpus roots its artistic meaning in recognizable seeds
of creativity.
Recently converted to Judaism, Hendrickson uses Hebrew words
to construct her bright new drawings. As
in her other recent series, she uses lines as a compositional starting
point. In the past the scalloped edges
of conch shells would become the building blocks of a composition. Today cut-out sinuous Hebrew fonts form the
impetus. These linear anchors are worked
over in thickening layers of pigment. In
the process compositional strengths become apparent to Hendrickson: an image
emerges. Color is subsequently layered against
and over the graphic substrate. As a
reality materializes, these abstractions tip into the world of
imagination. We can choose to see a letter
or a color, a tangent or a landscape, any reality, entirely our own.
Like so many waves lapping the beach, depositing sand in
haphazard and unexpected strata, Hendrickson allows her hand to move freely
about the page. Each new drawing offers
the opportunity to compose, decompose, and recompose at the whim of the line, of
her material, and of color. So too can
we. Allowing our eye to wander freely
around the whole sheet we may see something today which may not reveal itself
tomorrow.
While Hendrickson struggled with her decision to convert, and
to reveal this to others, she does not impose this decision on us. Rather, by coating the letters in echoing
lines and shades of color, we get to choose what shines through to us. Hendrickson does not conceal the Genesis of
these drawings. But she does dare us to
come out of hiding and see for ourselves.
As Kate Hendrickson divulges this most individual of aspects
of her life for all to see, she turns this hidden journey into a visual
diary. As we stand in front of her
bright drawings, and let our mind travel, they encourage us to really look, and
really see, and be at peace with our decisions: artistic, emotional, and
spiritual.
