Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Bonzzer is Learning to Sketch, and So He Practices Sketching from the Back of Buses, Muskegon Area Transit System.

Bonzzer learned the raw rudiments of drawing from his mother, an arts & craft artist who actually studied at the Detroit Institute of Arts. However, he let his skills and practice languished as he paper chased after a professional degree at a Midwestern University. As a result of his enrollment in a drawing class at the Fire Barn Gallery, Grand Haven, he has undertaken the daily habit of drawing in odd moments, such as while commuting by the natural gas powered buses of the Muskegon Area Transit System. His instructors and coaches, Chris Protas and Tyler Loftis, have praised his progress. His friend, the backslid artist Manna Turow, has praised the heaviness and even arrogance of his line. However, Bonzzer has not found satisfaction in his end results. Amazing, his instructor, Protas, has enjoined him to post his sketches online and share them with that West Michigan man of the arts, Captain Art Walk. Protas knows drawing at least as well as the mark makers of the Lascaux Cave, and Bonzzer has chosen to follow his direction.

He listens well to Tyler Loftis, although Loftis requires some decoding. An artist has to ponder Loftis's words for a few weeks before those words of instruction unfold in the water of imagination. Loftis feels that drawing is a great mystery that happens in the interaction of looking and mark making, and every struggle yields noble results that take about an eon of time progression to comprehend. Bonzzer has heard that Loftis has a bit of Greek-American heritage, and that probably explains why Loftis often speaks in mythic and epochal terms.

Lately, Bonzzer has taken to drawing in Premium Sketchbook from Peter Pauper Press purchased from the Rheba's Paper Place in downtown Grand Haven. He likes the portability of it. He eschews sketching in pencil or charcoal. The reasons stems from learning his letters in first grade at Byron Elementary School. When he had mastered his letters in print and cursive, his first grade teacher approved him to write in ink. That was Bonzzer's first of many promotions, and he's never willingly employed a pencil to write and sketch since. Loftis and Protas haven't made an issue of it yet.

Thus, Bonzzer has taken to the long seat at the end of the bus and drawing the riders who arrive in their winter gear, especially December 22 & 23 when seventeen inches fell upon a day of freezing rain. The hoodies and knit caps and boots make beautiful shapes that are basic to draw, and Bonzzer wonders if the view of noble MATS riders from the anonymous view of the back of the bus might be metaphorically similar to haystacks, the haystacks that allowed Monet to experiment with color and light and shade. 

Jason Eisner practices drawing the splayed and lyrical shapes of deer carnage upon the side of interstates, and Bonzzer finds the shapes of winter garments to be lyrical and noble too. Great people arrive and depart and all times on the excellent buses of the MATS line, and Bonzzer draws them as if he were drawing an eternal present, as if the shutter of a camera stayed open. As his skill increases, it will be soon possible to fill every bus seat in Bonzzer's drawing from the rear seat view.

If a fellow rider and comrade notices Bonzzer working quickly to capture a moment in transportation time, he explains his mission and promises to alter identifying details ever so slightly. So far, all the MATS community who have notice have been cool with Bonzzer's project.

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