Bespoke Gallery is pleased to present Recent Drawings, Patrick Keesey’s first solo exhibition with the gallery. A reception for the artist will be held on Thursday, June 25th from 6 to 8 p.m.

The exhibition features over forty abstract small scale ink on paper drawings. Keesey’s drawings explore the tension between seeing and marking, and the fundamental balance and imbalance of these processes in making art.

Rather than representing the subject, his drawings record the action and immediacy of seeing itself. Remaining in the moment, Keesey notes the movement of the eye as it skips over a subject, focuses on one point, or changes subjects entirely. He draws as the eye looks, keeping his hand moving in pace with the eye as it observes. Without a predetermined idea of the resulting image, or a direct concern for its representation, he responds to each subject intuitively. The resulting works are intimate meditations on the role of the artist in translating, adopting, enhancing or creating visual cues.

Keesey commits himself to immediacy in his drawings, examining the relationship between the actions of looking and mark-making. Fundamentally, his drawing practice is about the observation of observation – and the impermanence of how we observe and what we observe. He watches himself look, as his hand documents the process. “It is a practice that informs me of a world that is not, and cannot, be understood in a systematic, rational, or pragmatic way. [It] often feels like a scientific pursuit, a practice based on trial and error, that inadvertently notes the disparity between the the outer world and the inner being.”

Keesey employs color in his drawings almost as a complement to the movements of his eye and hand. His usage of ink and pigments are frequently made in response to the subliminal specificity of place, but fundamentally serve to support his drawing process rather than complete it.

Keesey is originally from Los Angeles and currently resides in New York City and Marfa, Texas. He graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design with a BFA in Painting. The artist has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions and his paintings and drawings are featured in a number of private collections.