We turn our first piece over to you.

Bri and I have just finished our first collaborative drawing/collage of the semester.  A long time coming, but it just didn't scream STOP at us until Bri threw that piece of charcoal at it, ceremoniously putting our last mark on the paper.  However, it isn't finished.  We began this piece with the intention of sending it out into the world like a blank page of a coloring book: we want it to be a source of play for anyone who comes into contact with it.  So, our responsibility has been to compose well, to limit ourselves to black and white, and to restrain ourselves from controlling every area of the page with texture and value.  When we place it in a show at a local synagogue (more information on this to come) next month, we will include coloring instruments (I bought an enormous box of crayons for the occasion, but I think Bri wants markers available too) for our audience to use at their leisure.   To color it in.  Images and collaborative statement about the piece below:

Kerdieekrdaad  (aka Bri Barton and Jackie Maloney)
October 6, 2010



Fill in Later is a continuation of a collaborative experiment intended to discover what is possible when the creative process becomes a shared experience.

It is an exploration of the viewer’s relationship to a work and how one might react when gallery etiquette is challenged.

We don’t like how the artist always gets to make the stuff, and the viewer always views it. We want to share, so everyone does a little making and everyone does a little looking.

Fill in Later is a reverting back to the simplicities of childhood, when being a good artist meant successfully coloring within the lines.

Fill in Later might catalyze new friendships and worldviews.

Fill in Later observes what this world is, what it isn’t, and what it could be, which is all a matter of individual opinion.

It is possible for you to make Fill in Later ugly (ugly is in the eye of the beholder), but it is not possible for you to screw it up.

What a funny surprise to find in a space where one is typically told, “look don’t touch.”

Fill in Later is an inside joke that we would like to share.