Journal of Contemporary Art |WritINGs AND DRAWINGS Richard Artschwager Judith Barry Mike Bidlo Special Jennifer Bolande Projects Barry Bridgwood Robert Gober Joseph Kosuth Jonathan Lasker Elizabeth Murray Arnulf Rainer William Wegman David Wojnarowicz Christopher Wool Fall/Winter 1988Elizabeth Murray The text statements are based on comments made in an interview conducted by Jonathan Seliger and John Zinsser at the artists studio inNew York, April, 1988. he ball-point pen drawings, selected from arecent sketchbook, are a visual description of her working process. 31My excitement is really in making the work. I never know exactly how it’s going to be. I don’t have an image in my mind when T start it—I have awish, maybe. Butithasn’tbeen fulfilled, And when ithappens, when the painting finally happens for me, it’s when the things I've wanted to see come together, and I haven't known what itis. I would like someone who is looking at it to have that kind of experience, of almost having to make it themselves. ‘The drawings are like the little thought bubbles that are able to sit here and talk—and anything can happen. They're free. Idon’ttry tomake them artful inany way, Ijust do them. They're completely open, and every idea that comes into my head I'll jot down. So the painting is stiff. It’s like this decision that you have to wrestle with back to some spontaneous place. ‘The process of painting for me is a process of revealing. The drawings are all about revelation—it’s about exposure. But when you start a painting, there’s always that part of you that wants to conceal, and let the painting be this mask. The thing itself is a mask. And the whole process is about trying to smash the mask and be open again, be exposed, be vulnerable. Sometimes!’Il start to draw and the painting will tell me what could happen. I'l discover it through drawing.