Drawing with Blue 

Curator: This is Richard Ruben’s “Drawing with Blue,” currently held at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. It’s a mixed media work incorporating watercolor, ink, and other materials on paper. Editor: It gives the immediate impression of fragility, of something delicately held together. The textures are so varied, from the sharp ink lines to the watercolor washes. It feels quite precarious. Curator: Yes, I find that the geometric elements—especially the linear arrangement—counterbalance the fluidity of the washes. Note the careful positioning of the three blue points, echoed by the gridded field of metallic browns. This activates the negative space. Editor: Precisely! And it's compelling how those little spots seem almost like…fasteners? Something holding the drawing itself onto the paper, drawing your attention to the physical act of its construction. I am thinking about Ruben’s studio. What was his relationship to the means, the making? Curator: A compelling proposition, the means become the message! I observe how the artist has skillfully layered textures and lines, creating depth and movement within an abstract composition. It is the structural relationships that constitute the content of this artwork. Editor: But what do these decisions communicate regarding his creative process, what part of Ruben’s world came through him via these materials? Consider his choice of materials; his physical engagement with ink, watercolour. Those speak volumes! Curator: Indeed. However, within that controlled disorder, there's a clear articulation of form. It's a balancing act of chance and calculated placement. I find this echoes modernist ideals of exploring the essence of visual language, without the burden of representation. Editor: Yet by leaving evidence of process bare on the surface, “errors,” corrections become the artwork itself, or parts of its very substance, inviting questions about our consumptive and material culture as opposed to merely aesthetic achievement. Curator: Fascinating how one artwork yields such different readings depending on our analytical framework! Editor: Indeed. Ruben’s “Drawing with Blue" is far more layered than it first appears; there is meaning in these materials.