Pen & Ink Drawings as Art Therapy

I think of my pen & ink work as a necessary art therapy. I have to pick up the pen and ink every fifteen years or so. This work doesn’t produce high art; It involves the making of marks that are little more than doodles at their beginnings. 

I also like to play with my Shadow self. We are shameless trollops, Shadow and me. These days we work on plain white paper where nobody can really get hurt. Together in ink, we work toward a sense of agreement and renewal.

“Dancing for Julio” (below) is a self-portrait. It comes from the last art therapy session I did with pen and ink in 1994.

At the time I made this drawing, our house had been for sale for nearly two years without the prospect of a buyer. (The inverted statue of St. Joseph buried near the mango tree didn’t seem to be working.) 

One day in February a young man showed up to look at the vacancy in our grandfathered garage apartment. The prospective renter, a young Peruvian employed by one of the finer restaurants in Sarasota, had a patron. The patron wanted improvements made to the garage apartment and was willing to pay the expenses of new floor tiles, etcetera.

Hence, I elected to accept the gracious offer that paid material expenses and I gathered my tools for the renovation project that would lead to the completion of Ink Therapy Session 1.

Shortly thereafter the renovations, the house sold.

Any questions?