Residual Ink Drawings

Residual Ink Drawings – CYMK & Maintenance Tank

Artist Statement

Residual Ink Drawings plays with the materials of inkjet printing to point out one of the most basic premises of photography, that it is a representation of something outside itself.

In this series I repurpose the waste from the inkjet printing process, collecting empty cartridges and full maintenance tanks from various consumer and professional inkjet printers. My process begins by unsealing empty cartridges and pouring the unused ink directly onto photo rag paper, allowing it to freely seep into the paper, leaving behind formless stains on both the recto and verso. I then scan and print these direct imprints (front and back) employing the controlled digital inkjet printing process. Care is taken to align the recto and verso, maintaining the integrity of the object, making its reproduction complete.

I then display the original drawing alongside its photographic doppelganger, setting up a tension between the two realities, the actual and the artifice. The materiality and appearance of the two prints are similar yet one is created directly from materials; the other is translated through photographic digital data. One IS something while the other is a representation OF something. As the inkblot imprints take on the characteristics of a Rorschach test, they point to the subjective interpretation of all representation. I aim to illustrate that photographs in themselves do not present meaning but that meaning is assigned. Photographs offer and preserve appearances and exist independently from what they represent.

Filled maintenance cartridges from professional inkjet printers are also used in this series. After removing the ink-soaked felt pads from their encasing and place them directly between two sheets of photo rag paper, allowing them to leave behind traces of their own materiality. The resulting unique prints are then subjected to the same treatment as the ink cartridge prints (scanning and printing the verso and recto).

This project explores the immediacy of mark making while examining the possibilities of the photographic process and its materials. Aspects of chance and control are layered with concepts of process and materiality focusing on the interplay of image, surface and object.

My engagement with photography is centered within an inquiry of the medium itself and is driven by the desire to make pictures that are interesting for reasons other than what they depict while reflecting upon the nature of reproduction, representation, perception, and interpretation.

Availability & Pricing

All prints are unique. Size is approximate as each vary slightly.
Current prices range from $1000 – $3000 USD.

Please contact the gallery for more information, including current availability and pricing.

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EXHIBITIONS

Trace • Copy • Render: Alex Fischer, Rita Maas, Susana Reisman, Sharon Switzer, Circuit Gallery @Prefix ICA, Toronto, September 2016