Amalgamation: Returning to an Old Sketchbook, Eighteen Years Later
Pen and ink contemporary fine art by Doug Ashby.
Amalgamation: the action, process, or result of combining or uniting.
Every element of this artwork comes from a sketchbook I used about eighteen years ago. I recently went through it, and it was a walk down memory lane. It covers a period of great change and transition in my life. What struck me most was how much looser I was with the sketchbook then compared to how I work now. Somewhere along the way I became more defined in my approach to image-making. Tighter, more controlled. I’m not sure if that’s a positive or a negative. It simply is what I grew into.
I have a clear memory of drawing the architectural element. I was sitting alone at a restaurant bar, working in my sketchbook, facing an open kitchen. The crisp lines and defined linear perspective were generalizations of the building itself, an intriguing structure I sketched out while I sat there. That day I also did several studies of the chef in action, something I hardly do anymore but need to loop back into my practice.
The brain cell in the lower left emerged several pages later. I can’t say exactly why I started drawing brain cells at that moment. I think it had something to do with a passing belief that medical illustration might be a path to a career. The original drawing balanced octopus-like spindles against the main cell in a kind of diptych; I still have it. Here, I simply borrowed the brain cell and placed it within the composition. Brain cells have been a constant in my work ever since.
The geometric elements are something I was playing with at the time. In the sketchbook, notes beside several of these studies read “Max Ernst,” with an arrow pointing toward them. I find that interesting now, because most of Ernst’s work isn’t built on this kind of imagery. He’s regarded primarily as a Dadaist and Surrealist. But he does have a body of pure abstraction that plays with similar shapes, and something must have connected for me at the time. I was in grad school when I filled this sketchbook, and maybe I stumbled onto something that stuck. In my post-teaching life, I plan to return to art history and study more. Maybe I’ll uncover what I was thinking about back then.
The moons are the new part, though they do creep into the sketchbook unwittingly. At the time they were just circles. Years later, a friend challenged me to make my moons look more like actual moons. In some ways I still have miles to go on that front, but in this piece I stayed true to where I was at the time.
For this artwork, I skipped the initial sketch test of the amalgamated composition. I placed the elements on paper as seen and began the pen-and-ink work directly. That’s a bold move for me. For years I worked in a controlled manner, following my ball-point sketch almost exactly. I used to tell my students that by the time you reach the final artwork, the guesswork should be done. It should be about execution at your highest level. I still believe that, to a degree. But I’m learning to unlearn it, and to let more spontaneity into the work. It feels like an area of growth I can lean into now that my stippling technique has matured enough to support it.
So what did I hope to achieve with this piece?
Honestly, I think it was just to revisit my former self as an artist and bring him back to life, nearly two decades later. I want to build a looser process, one that responds faster to what I’m actually thinking. Maybe the years of tight control were necessary, a springboard of confidence I can now be more playful from. Looking back through this old sketchbook, I see naivety, but also some core practices I lost along the way. Practices I believe will serve me well moving forward.
Art isn’t static the way the finished object is, physically unchanged once it’s made. But art is never static from the viewer’s side, even when the viewer is the artist. That insight is exactly what I need right now, and it’s why I’ve been spending so much time with my older work. It’s there to serve me: to show me where I was, and where I need to go next.
I think this sketchbook amalgamation could become a series worth pursuing. Maybe it doesn’t have to stay limited to sketchbooks. Maybe it becomes something broader. For now, I’ll stick with my old sketches and see where they take me.
After all, the process is the point. Once the work is done, its life moves beyond my influence. Once I put it into the world, it belongs to the viewer. Good or bad, in my mind, is irrelevant. But I do like this one.
This artwork is available for purchase, $350, 5” x 7”. Click here to purchase, or reach out through my contact page with any questions.
Thanks,
Doug
