Robert longo on jackson pollock biography

Steve: I’m looking at your tools. You have a brush, the eraser to dig. It’s like an archeological excavation.

Robert: I graduated with a sculpture degree.

In my mind I am a sculptor, not a painter. These drawings are truly sculptural.

Robert longo on jackson pollock biography

The process of these drawings is the opposite of traditional painting. Traditional painting works from dark to light. I work from a white surface. The white in the drawings is always the raw, virgin paper. I never add white to the drawings.

Robert longo on jackson pollock biography art paintings style death

The drawings get built up with so many layers of charcoal and dust and powder and stick. The way the drawing comes to life is by erasing, carving the image out of it. You have to realize the depth in which you can go; if you fuck the paper up, you can never get it back.

They’re like mineshaft disasters where you can never get back to white.

Robert longo on jackson pollock biography book

We make different kinds of erasers. When we made those abstract expressionist paintings we made erasers to imitate the grain of the canvas for the Barnett Newman piece. I’m