Unnerving 

Editor: So, here we have Sarah Joncas' drawing called "Unnerving," which seems to be a pencil portrait. It strikes me as rather haunting; the way the tree branches overlay her face... What's your take on this piece? Curator: Right, "Unnerving." Focusing on the process here, look at the very directness of pencil on paper. It democratizes art, it makes it feel immediate, relatable. And the unsettling beauty lies, precisely, in that combination of delicacy in rendering, but also the inherent accessibility of the medium. Editor: Accessibility? How so? Curator: Pencil isn't oil paint. There isn't that barrier of specialized skills or materials. Drawing with pencil can be considered mundane – which is what elevates the concept here. Consider the way mass production also influences the creation. Editor: Mass production affecting a portrait drawing? Curator: Exactly. Joncas’ materials—pencils, paper—are industrially manufactured. They come with their own histories and labor, right? So the very act of using these mass-produced tools impacts the meaning we create with them. We internalize all aspects of its being made available to us. Does that change how you see the branches melding with her features? The commercial element meeting the ethereal, perhaps? Editor: I see what you mean. I hadn’t really thought about it like that, the link to production of its parts. I think it is definitely easier to appreciate all these complex factors by relating this artwork with these ideas. Curator: It pushes past that divide. It lets us question the nature of labor involved and also the relationship with materiality of the portrait itself.