Five years of university sketchbook fragments — drawn in black ballpoint pen, gel pen, and marker on translucent brown recycled paper — torn and bound directly onto the surface primarily using hemp rope, with white glue applied sparingly only at a few seam points where the rope passes through the paper, to prevent those specific junctures from tearing further. The base layer beneath the sketches is a paint-by-numbers canvas originally painted by a former partner. I ripped off the canvas and repurposed the wood frame here as a scaffold rather than discarding it. The reverse of the work consists entirely of knots; the structure holds primarily by tension and interlace, with only minimal reinforcement. This method leaves the work largely vulnerable — air movement or rope tension can still tear the paper, and the piece continues to shift and change shape over time.
This work was never planned. It accumulated — one sketch at a time, across five years of a depressive period in university, drawn without knowing what would emerge until a face appeared under the pen. Drawing became a recurring presence during the hardest stretches. It is not a planned behaviour or a solution, but an erratic companion. Each sketch is what loneliness looked like on a given night, made slightly less unbearable by the act of making it. The fragility is the most honest material decision in the entire work: what was made in fragility should remain fragile, visibly, structurally, for as long as it exists, just like how I spent time with loliness in endless nights. So I can say that this work is a combination of the past five years' negative emotions. It's like a record of what I have been through.
