59” x 55”, sepia pencil, walnut ink, studio debris, mud, and rainwater on paper.
To make this drawing, I started by making a rubbing of one of the London Plane tree stumps in Coffey Park. I then traced the rubbing, translating those scratches and grooves into marks and gestures, then transfered those traced and drawn translations onto another sheet of paper. Once I had the drawing transferred to the watercolor paper, I covered it with mud from a nearby vacant lot, along with studio debris. I brought the muddy drawing outside during the heavy rains that flooded New York City on September 29th, 2023, and let the rain soak and stain the paper. After the paper dried, I scrubbed and scraped until I found the original image, a process of retrieval that many go through in the wake of storms.
