James Drake had a simple goal. He wanted to show the world what goes on in an artist's brain.
In his exhibit “The Anatomy of Drawing and Space (Brain Trash)," the Santa Fe-based artist displays two years of daily drawings of human anatomy, animals, scientific formulas, original poetry and thousands of illustrations. He also took his goal of peeking into an artist's brain to heart by incorporating MRI images of his own brain into the floor-to-ceiling exhibit.
According to Drake, the scatterbrained installation as a whole represents a “stream of consciousness” and therefore doesn't have an easily identifiable theme. The theme, he says, is formed by the individual viewers as they gather images to create a uniquely personal perspective.
"It’s like a novel”, Drake explains. “All the way down to the single drawing, which you could consider to be words."
Using pencil, charcoal, ink and stencil work, Drake was able to complete his floor-to-ceiling project and display it in the Blanton Museum under the subtitle “Brain Trash," which he says aptly represents the concept of his exhibition. The exhibition will be on display until January 4, 2015.
