Roberta Allen Art & Writing & One-on-One Workshops
ARROW DRAWINGS 1970 - 1974
Arrows indicate direction or placement. In my drawings, arrows represent being as ascent and being as fall. As rising and falling energy patterns, arrows refer through repetition to Kierkegaard’s idea of endlessness; additions of finite-nesses rather than infinity.
I was inspired by The Sickness Unto Death. My interpretation of his paradox is that infinity cannot be perceived through the rational mind, nevertheless we seek to perceive it through the rational mind. Ascending and descending arrows represent an attempt at transcendence.
In these drawings, I define subjective views as facts. Kierkegaard asserted that our deepest experiences occur in the form of contra-dictions, and wherever there is contradiction, the comical is present.
"The supreme paradox of all thought is the attempt to discover something that thought cannot think." --Kierkegaard
Description (Clockwise):
1 “The Protective Shield As A Response To Chaos”, ink on paper, 11 9/16 x 9 7/19 inches
2 “Environmental Current Transformed Into Protective Shield Suffocating Flow,” ink on paper, 11 1/8 x 7 3 /16 inches
3 “Pointless Arrows As Obstructions To The Flow Drawing A,” ink on paper, 11 3/4 x 9 1/8 inches
4 “The Environmental Current Altered By The Flow”, ink on paper, 11 x 7 1/8 inches
From The Boundary series
5 "The Boundary As Impenetrable," ink on paper, 14 x 11 inches, 1974
6 "Conflicting Flow: Attraction & Repulsion Towards The Boundary," ink on paper, 14 x 11 inches, 1974
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Images from a large series 1970 -1973
Selections from a large series