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Matt Bryans’ drawings are produced by erasing images printed on pieces of newspaper recovered from the streets of London, Bryans does not so much remove what is on the newspaper page as edit it. He retains some things from the original images, eliminates others altogether, and allows still others to remain as smeared, ghostly traces. Untitled, 2005, a large-scale, ziggurat-shaped wall assemblage of rectangular pieces of newspaper, consists of photographs of faces from which virtually all traces of individuality have been erased except the eyes. These peer out from eerie, mask like visages, occasionally accompanied by hints of a nose or mouth. The work’s palette is a greyish brown reminiscent of Analytical Cubism, as is its space, which is broken up into facets by the clippings’ edges. Using a simple pencil eraser Bryans converts the world’s news into a collage and speaks more pictorially of shifts in tone and colour, than of famine or murder or sporting victory. Bryans is interested in the media’s tendency to flatten an individual’s experience, and in turn figurative representation may be loosened, creating a suggestive atmosphere . |
