56 HENRY is pleased to present Monochromatic Drawings, an exhibition of new work by Richard Tinkler on view from November 1 through December 22, 2024 at 56 Henry Street. This is Tinkler's fifth solo exhibition with the gallery.

Drawing and painting are of equal importance to my artistic practice. Some ideas work more naturally in painting and some work better in drawing. For me, ideas that work well as paintings have a lot to do with the wetness and physicality of the paint. Drawings work better for detail. I make each painting all at once, wet into wet, in one day. Conversely, I make the drawings over the course of days or even weeks, and I work on several at the same time. Ideas are just as likely to move from the paintings to the drawings as they are to move from the drawings to the paintings.

When I am drawing, I start in the middle and build up the image. I seek out different ways to divide the space. I use a straight edge, but I don’t measure. Instead, I try to make it as even as I can by eye. Because of this, the center is never in the actual center and nothing is really symmetrical. The drawings are based on how well I can do something naturally, so they end up having a consistency that makes them look more exact than they actually are.

Because my practice is based on what comes naturally to me, I’m not very likely to make mistakes while making a drawing. My use of color intentionally breaks up the overall structure and illustrates my drawing methodology. In this set of drawings, I only use one color per drawing. I refer to them as monochromes, although I do realize this is not technically true. There are three different kinds of monochrome drawings in this show: Drawings that are completely filled in, drawings that are more dense in the center and fade toward the edges, and drawings where I’ve stopped at a seemingly arbitrary point.

One of my main concerns in my work is the relationship between figure and field. It’s an avenue for abstract art to talk about the experience of real life - the way it feels to be an individual in the world, both affected by and affecting it. More importantly, my drawings talk about how this experience is constantly changing and evolving over time. In the drawings that are completely filled in, the whole drawing is a field of figures. In the other drawings, there is a more defined figure and the focus of the work is centered around the transition from the figure to the background. Sometimes I draw until it feels done, which is the case for some of these works. Other times, I had stopped for some reason and, looking back, realize the drawings were already done.

Text by Richard Tinkler

Richard Tinkler was born in 1975, in Westminster Maryland. He currently lives and works in New York City. He received a BA in 1999 from the University of North Texas, and an MFA in 2003 from Hunter College. He has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Sebastian Gladstone Gallery in Los Angeles, CA, Halsey McKay Gallery in East Hampton, NY, Team Gallery in New York, NY, LaMontagne Gallery in Boston, MA and Albert Merola Gallery in Provincetown, MA. Richard Tinkler is represented by 56 HENRY.