CAST       Ink on Paper, 27 x 14"

In the late Summer of 1986 Marsha and I visited the Washington County Fair just West of Portland, Oregon.  We did all the usual things; plus we arrived just in time to see the rodeo!  We had to walk through one of the fair’s barns to get there.  This is the moment when I snapped the photo that would become Cast.  If one looks closely, one can see the reflection of me and my camera in the TV screen.  And the TV screen was exactly why this composition appealed.  It seemed a great combination of the themes in my two previous drawings  Grill and On Television.  And there was that little girl - almost seeming to rise above it all...

 

I decided to use the very same large “base” techniques that I had used in the oversize drawings in this smaller scale work.  The trick would be to use larger - and, as a result, fewer - stippled dots to achieve the same level of shading.  This meant being especially precise with  placement.  It also meant eschewing too much detail and allowing the synergy of the now fewer marks to do more work. The result is what I still think was my most assured work up until that moment. Too bad it was to be my last for 20 years.

DRAFT