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Flicker in the Work
Author(s): Jasper Johns and Richard Shiff

Source: Master Drawings, Vol. 44, No. 3 (Autumn, 2006), pp. 275-298
Published by: Master Drawings Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20444460
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Flicker in theWork
JASPERJOHNS IN CONVERSATION WITH RICHARD SHIFF
RS: You've been interviewed many times, Jasper, JJ: I choose things that I like. Chance is often
and-may I say it?-you're a good interviewee. involved.Sometimessomethingisbroughttomy
You answerquestions
with friendly
challengesto attention. There may be an unconscious attrac
the thinking of the questioner. I won't attempt tion, something kinetic or even kinesthetic in
to cover all the usual territorybecause we want nature. And there may follow a rationalization,
to focus on your attitudes toward drawing. "I like thisbecause...." Artistsgrow in sophisti
You've certainlybeen innovativein drawing, cation, make many distinctions, break things into
extending the range of themedium by inventing pieces or join things across gaps. There are also
new techniques.I'm especiallystruckby your technical interests and surprises: "How was this
work in ink on plastic (see Fig. 13), which applies or that done?"
a traditional
vehicle to an unconventional
support.
But it seems tome that in some respect you revi R S: Do these drawings set some kind of stan
talize every drawing technique you take up. dard for you? Are theirmakers doing something
you either do or would like to do?
JJ:
Wouldn't you say that of any artist you liked,
Richard?Any artistyou foundinteresting? JJ: I doubt that I want to do what others are
doing, but I might like to be able to do what
RPS: I suppose I might, but there are degrees: they are doing. It is a hopeless ambition, of
degreesof surprise.
degreesof innovation, You've course, but there persists an idea, perhaps mis
your viewers fordecades, even
been surprising taken, that to be able to do something is to
those familiarwith the ways you prefer to work. understandit.
You've shown me some of the drawings you've
collected,and thereare surprises
there,too.You RS: Do you nevertheless learn from the draw
have Cezanne in depth (e.g., see Figs. 8-10, 12), ings thatyou've collected?
De Kooning in depth (e.g., Fig. 1),1 a remark
able working drawing from Seurat (Fig. 2),2 an JJ: Probably, but I don't know what. The pres
Old Master study with an elegant use of hatch ence of a work within one's own environment
ing (see Fig. 11), and as compelling an example tends to be noticed, to force or encourage ideas
of children's drawing as I've ever seen (see Fig. to develop. One may engage in a sort of sub
19). I wonder why you choose what you do. liminal"conversation"
with thework.
275
Figure 1
WILLEM DE
KOONING
Untitled,1951
Collection ofJasper
Johns (? 2006 The
Willem de Kooning
Foundation/Artists
Rights Society
[ARS], New York)
276
R S: This is the reward, I suppose, for artistswho
are also collectors. Jasper, I don't want to be too
repetitive,
and Iknow that
you'vealreadyexplained
a lot about your involvement with drawing in
the statements you made to Ruth Fine and Nan
Rosenthal. I'm referring to the interview they
conductedforyour drawingsretrospective
at the
National Gallery of Art in 1990.3
JJ: I don't remember the form of it. It was a

long time ago.
R S: When Ruth and Nan asked about your early

training, you said you had very little formal edu
cation in art, the kind of education thatwould
have developed skillsin renderinga livemodel,
constructing
perspective, and thelike.Then why
did you end up drawing so much? I'm intrigued
by what you said at that time, and perhaps you A ;*2~'~**t*;
to beingmotivat
might elaborate.You referred
ed by feeling "some necessity" to draw as well
as feeling a "delight" in making your drawings.4
Would you put it thatway today-a combina
tion of necessity and delight? When I look at
your drawings, the delight seems evident to me,
but why is there a necessity?
JJ:Most of us have an underlying sense of help

lessness, a necessity to make what we call our
work. Many have the odd sensation of being
called upon to do it.There is usually some com
bination of pleasure and anxiety connected to the
activity; there are aspects of play, of control and
trickery.Anyone who has been at it as long as
I have will remember multiple states of mind that
at one time or another have been useful or,
rather, have contributed to the process. This is
Figure 2
not about drawing, of course, but about art
GEORGES
making in general.
SEURAT
Tate de Clown,
R S: What do you mean by trickery?
1890
Collection of
JJ:On the simplest level, the deliberate aspects
jasperjohns
in a work of art that are intended to cause the
mind to wonder. Trompel'oeilmight contain
examples.
277
""PIC
RS: Would trickery-or perhaps art of any type enough determined that I can think of it as pre
Figure 3
or method-offer a way of converting the art existing.
JASPER
JOHNS maker's anxietyinto formsof eithercontrolor
Three Flags,1958 pleasure? I don't mean that one takes pleasure in R S: So you sometimesinventyour own ready
Whitney control, but perhaps pleasure and control are par
New York, made imagery-that, too, seems like a kind of
Museum ofAmericanallel remediesto the sense of helplessnessthat trickery.
But to get back to thespecificproblem
Art (c 2006Jasper
Johns!VAGA, you
refer to. W
ould you agree? of drawing.... Probablyneitherof us is com
New York) fortablefollowingstrictdefinitionsof what a
JJ: I am uncertain. drawingis and isn't.Are you comfortable with
the term"markmaking"? Does it solve theprob
RS: Another thing you mentioned to Ruth and lemof distinguishinga drawingfroma painting
Nan and to other interviewers is that you're by identifying a certain class of marks or a cer
attracted to "images of a schematic nature or tain way of applying them?
imagesthatlend themselvesto schematization,"
and that such images becomethe raw material JJ:It is difficult
to describedifferences
thatdis
for your art. tinguishdrawingfrom,say,painting.What come
to mind, in trying, are differences in medium
JJ:I continue to favor such things. If I "invent" and support.Drawings tend to be monochro
an image, I enjoy having the schema carefully matic and, often,smallerin scale thanpaintings.
278
a
I II
I
i
i
I
- - -. . C
The materials of painting usually allow one to once toldWalter Hopps (in 1965) in an inter
Figure 4
cover what is on the canvas with more of those view thatscholarshave oftenquoted: "Generally
JASPER JOHNS
materials. But in drawing, a point is reached, the drawings have been made just to make the
Three Flags, 1959
beyond which no addition can correct what is drawing, and the simplest way forme to do it
present.An eraser,thoughtof in time,might was to base it on a painting which existed, London, Victoria &
Albert Museum (?
have helped.Comparedwith paintings,thebest althoughtheygenerallydon't follow thepaint
2006JasperJohns!
drawings tend to seem more succinct, more aus ingveryclosely."6 VAGA, New York)
tere,more schematic,more naked, closer to
thought,closerto theforcefromwhich theyarise. JJ:Well, it depends on what one might mean
by "very closely." I think my drawings would
R S: You've pointed out on a number of occa rarelybe thoughtexact representations
of the
sions that the vast majority of your drawings have paintingstowhich theyrefer.
been done afterthepaintingsor the sculptures
that they resemble, that they aren't sketches of RS: I see your point. But don't you think that
ideas or studies for paintings that are to come, viewers like myself are likely to see the same
but rather, if thismakes sense, studies afteryour ness-perhaps because theremight simplybe a
own paintings. This would be a case of having, painting of a flag and then a drawing of a flag
as you say, a pre-existing schema. I know that (Figs. 3 and 4)7-whereas you see the difference
it's a very long time ago, but this is what you because the process of making the painting and
279
making the drawing is so different to you-and I wonder if you would comment on the defini
different in every instance? I suppose that if tion of drawing Serra gave in 1987: "Drawing is
thereweren't a difference,you wouldn't be another kind of language. Often, if you want to
doing it. After all, you make the works, and understand something, you have either to take
then you look at them. Your viewers only do it apart or to apply another kind of language to
When theylook, theyprobablystill
the looking. it. Since I startedworking, I have always thought
imagine that your drawings precede your paint that if I could draw something I would have a
ings (untiltheylearnotherwise). structural
comprehensionof it."And yet Serra
adds: "I do not draw to depict, illustrate, or dia
JJ: Perhaps some hard looking reveals the dif gram existing works."9 I suppose that a person
ferences that are there, regardless of what one might surmise that some of your drawings are
thinks about the priority of painting or drawing. "illustrations"
more thanthoughts-afterall, they
I work the way that I work. I have something often show, illusionistically,
how things that
inmind, some possibility to test or explore when you've constructedlook fromone fixedview
I make a drawing. But I do have the sense that point or another, almost as an architect might do
I am making a drawing even though I remem a rendering (Fig. 5).1 But each of these drawings
ber Louise Nevelson once tellingme, "Dear, one goes beyond illustration,
doesn't it?
doesn't make a drawing. One draws."
JJ: I suppose that I hope so. But even illustra
R S: Does thismean that you never draw aim tions almost always carry additional kinds or lev
lessly, as a kind of thinking process that need not els of meaning.
result in a work of art? Do you always expect
that a "work" will result from your process of R S: To speak of "meaning" in a more literal
drawing? way-I've been looking at a number of your
drawings of themotif that you title "Bushbaby"
JJ: Obviously, like most people, I sometimes (see Figs. 6 and 17). Maybe I should be famil
make marks in an aimless way, and such activi iar with what a bushbaby is, but all I come up
ty can be useful, I suppose. But in drawing, as with is the animal-a kind of lemur-and it's
in painting, one tends to expect a result, even spelled differently, as two separate words: bush
an unexpected result. baby. Well, Iwon't saymore about titles, unless
you would like to comment....
RS: Jasper, I'm sure that you're aware that your
work has inspired numerous late twentieth JJ:The word ismeant as a name for the paint
century artists. Perhaps the fact that so much of ing, not as a description.
the drawing of those who admire you doesn't
resemble yours in any obvious way indicates that R S: So I should think of meaning less literally
you've managed to transcend a narrow vision of then, more in keeping with what the image
what drawing (or art in general) can be. I noticed might reveal beyond its name. Each of your
recently that Richard Serra once listed you as Bushbaby drawings uses a technique that's
one of five twentieth-century artists who strangely unique to you. I'm looking at the one
achieved "essentialness" in drawing. The others that has an extremely fine, rather delicate appli
were Cezanne, Malevich, Mondrian, andMatisse cation of graphite that occupies a middle range
and you're the only late twentieth-century figure of value (Fig. 6).1 And yet, what could be more
in the group.8 Imention this because Serra makes natural than to use a pencil in thismanner, apply
certain drawings afteran associated sculpture, just ing a light touch to an instrument that responds
as you make drawings afteran associated painting. to a light touch! So are you making something
280
Figure 5
JASPER JOHNS
Bridge, 1997
Anonymous
Promised Gift to
theSan Francisco
Museum ofModern
Art (? 2006Jasper
Johns! VAGA,
New York)
281
Figure 6
JASPER JOHNS
Bushbaby, 2004
Collection
PNvate
(C 2006Jasper
VAGA,
Johns!
New York)
282
strange here, or are you making something that appears daunting to me. You change things in
is ordinary? thoroughly unexpectedways, and evenwhen the
change itselfseemsexpectedtheperceptualresult
JJ:The materials that one works with have qual of the change is surprising.
ities that assert themselves naturally, but they can
be manipulated,modified in varyingdegrees. JJ:But what I do is straightforward.Imake a paint
ing, and then I make a drawing of the painting.
RS: It seems that your answer is: neither strange,
nor ordinary. You so often find the elusive mid RS: This conversation makes me think of your
dle way, if that's a proper term for it.Here the well-known statementabout takingsomething
middle way appears as more of a percept than a and doing something to it. I found two other
concept. In thisBushbaby composition, it's as if statements of yours that get at the same point.
you were able to draw in gray instead of black On one occasion, you say: "[A painter] just paints
andwhite, even thoughyou'remaking relative paintingswithout a conscious reason."12On
ly dark lines against a white paper ground. another occasion, you put it this way: "Your
thought takes a certain form and you have to
JJ: I imagine that the effect is a function of the follow it."'3 Both statements cause me to think
medium. thatmaking a series of drawings of a set of relat
ed motifs,and using different
graphicmediums
RS: Does a drawing like this help you to under to do this-including the print mediums-that
stand your own thinking, to slow down for a all of this activity might allow you to catch up
moment, and to reflect on all of the transfor with your own thinking. Does itmake sense to
mations that a particular painting might have ask whether drawings allow a catching up as
developed?In thisBushbabydrawing,you insert opposed to a further extension of the implica
a fragment of the motif inverted in relation to tions of painting? Because all the implications are
the full variant to its left,which runs down the already there, are they not? And dividing the impli
side of the sheet. And then there's your illu cationsintodifferent drawingmediums,different
sionisticrendering ofwhat in thecorresponding aspects of presentation, might serve the purpose
picture would be attached wooden slats and a of making each implicit quality explicit.
piece of string.In yourpaintings,theseelements
would be "real" and moveable, but here they're JJ:There are periods in which it seems that the
fixed to the surface as a graphite rendering.... various approaches one makes to an image are
attempts to dismiss it.Maybe that is what you
JJ: There is play with the different dimensions, are talking about. Much of what I do seems to
sometimes, on others.
one dimensionremarking come from a kind of irritation that needs to be
got rid of But, of course, what is being dis
RS: There are so many of these relationships, missed is replaced by something else-it is a
and they seem so fluid.... vicious cycle.
JJ:We often find that one thing leads to anoth R S: Some of your drawings are so loose and
er, or that it doesn't. We see the thing in space sketchlike, so suggestive and open in themselves
and the space in things. Not every comment or (e.g., Fig. 7).14 And yet they too follow after a
gesture can be analyzed. painting, extending the theme, although often by
seeming to do something very specific, even lim
RS: Jasper-all thisbeing said-what you do when iting, to what you started with. I can't say that
motif to a drawingmotif I can figureout what the action or variation
you converta painting
283
Figutre7
JASPER JOHNS
Untitled, 2002
Los Angeles,
Collection ofKate
Ganz (? 2006
JasperJohns!
VAGA, New York)
284
actually amounts to in any given case. Is it that
the emotional resonance is different, even new,
in every instance? Is this one of the things that
drawing, and I suppose printmaking, is so good
at providing-a new feeling for every variation
of the theme, so that the feeling changes more
than the theme does?
JJ:The play between the image and the physi

cal structure interestsme. As that changes, any
description or perception of what thework is or
means seems to change.
R S: I know that you've remarked on the won

der of Cezanne's touch, but is part of your attrac
tion to his art that it uses a relatively limited set
of motifs, never exhausting what could be learned
from them, and that each of his works clearly 1
relates to all the others? And, further, that each
emotionallydifferent?
is nevertheless
JJ:The complexity of his work and its straight

forward methods are fascinating. Some works
seem almost inept and others almost flamboy
antlyvirtuosic.
R S: You have that terrific self-portrait drawing

"
(Fig. 8).
JJ:And a portrait of Madame (Fig. 9),16 and one

of the son (Fig. 10)"7-the whole family.
R S: The drawing you have of Mme Cezanne

it has the most delicate set of parallel strokes.
They shade the side of her face so effortlessly.
This can't be the work of someone who "could
Figure 8
not draw," as people have said of Cezanne. Do
you think he would have believed those who PAUL CEZANNE
dismissed him? Or, to the contrary, did he real Self-Portrait,

c. 1880
ize how amazingly good he was?
Collection of
JasperJohns
JJ: I don't know, but the drive to work seems
never to have diminished.
RS: We could say that of you too, of course.
285
Figure 9 Figure 10
PAUL CtZANNE PAUL CtZANNE
Portrait ofMine Portrait of a Child

Czanne, and Figure Studies,
c. 1883-85 c. 1875-77
Collection of Collection
ofd
jasperjohns 2
jasperjohns
286~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 4
Figure 11
BARTOLOMEO
PASSAROTTI
Hand Holding a
Piece of Drapery
and Three Separate
Hand and Arm
Studies, c. 1555-60
Collection of
JasperJohns
Now that I've been concentratingon your JJ: Surely, I'm not the only one who does that.
Cezannes, it seems as if, in his own time, he set
a precedent formany of the things you do your RS: No. But it seems so meaningful when you
self. He uses a certain kind of curly mark do it. I suppose I could contrast the hatching
almost absent-minded in the way it fills a pattern in your Old Master drawing by Passarotti
space and he uses a certain kind of hatch-mark. (Fig. 11)18 to your use of hatchings. For Passarotti,
It's common to think of him in terms of "con as beautiful as his technique may be, it's a means
struction," and yet he breaks his own marks to a representational end, whereas for you hatch
down into component forces.Sometimes the ing becomes its own motif, its own end. But
horizontalsseem to separatefromthe verticals. now Iwonder ifyou've proven that itwas actu
You do that,too, don't you? ally thisway for theOld Masters as well. Current
287
Figure 12
PAUL CEZANNE
(after
CARAVAGGIO)
D'apres Caravage:
Mise au tombeau,,
c. 1877-80
Collection of
jasper johns
A~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
practices have a way of adjusting our view of duction in a book. Your tracings (e.g., Fig. 13)
older practices. It's as ifwe need to realize that look as much like yours, as this one looks like
graphictechniquesare never
merely a byproduct Cezanne's.
of a representational process, but constitute at
least part of the point, part of themessage of the JJ: If you do the tracing, it looks as much like
drawing. your own drawing as any other drawing does.
Why wouldn't it?
JJ:And you think this is all evident in Cezanne?
You think that I see something of myself in the R S: I suppose some people would think that the
way Cezanne combines marks and also discon form of the thing you tracewould dominate the
nects them? He did tracings, you know. Did you character of your tracing.
notice the drawing on the other side of the room
(Fig. 12)?"9 JJ: I don't think that it does, and you seem to
concur.
R S: I hadn't noticed it. So that's by Cezanne as
well. Maybe it's the only pure tracing by him RS: I suppose that I do. The medium and the
that remains. I suppose it's traced from a repro hand dominate, not the thematics of the image.
288
Figure 13
JASPER JOHNS
(afterPAUL
CEZANNE)
Tracing after
Czanne, 1994
Collection of the
Artist (?D 2006
jasperJohns/
VAGA, New York)
289
Do you think that the artist's hand the hand simplyto thickentheplot.
doing the drawing-is itself like a distinctive
medium: that it determines the quality of the RS: But sometimes you say of yourself-well,
form in a way that's analogous to how themate not precisely that you can't draw-but that you
rialmedium determinesthe form?How much draw in the only way you know how, and that
Cezanne is in your ink-on-plastic tracing of the you find it useful to do tracings and work from
Large Bathers (Fig. 13),2? and how much Johns? images that have already found some kind of
graphic form. This is yourmethod, isn't it?
JJ: The drawings depend on the Cezanne for
their meaning. But I suppose that some might JJ: It isn't "mine." It is a way of working.
say that I have robbed the work of itsmeaning. Nothing preventsyou fromdoing it too.
RS: I'm not certain that I understand. Would RS: I hesitate to say this since it could be misun
you supposedly be robbing it of itsmeaning by derstood, but many of your drawings seem to
taking the emphasis off the theme of bathers, or functionas reductionsof themore complicated
would it be because you had transformed the paintings from which they derive-they could
visual look of thework? I guess itmight be both, also be called concentrations or even intensifica
or that one entails the other.... Well, here's tions of effectsmore dispersed in your paintings.
another way of putting it: how dependent on
the medium of ink-on-plastic are those draw JJ:Yes, sometimes they may be elaborations or
ings?Ink-on-plastic
certainly
doesn'tmake trac modifications.
ing easy. More than most mediums, doesn't this
one force the artist to do what themedium wants RS: What about the fact that your paintings so
(if I can put it that way)? often have attachments and odd collage elements?
They become noticeably,sometimesaggressive
JJ: I suppose that every medium exerts a pres ly three-dimensional.
And thenyour drawing
sure, but one of the beautiful things about this "reduces" it all to two dimensions (e.g., Figs. 3
one is that it can have a life that seems clearly and 4).
independent of me. I seem to have almost noth
ing to do with it, to be an observer. But of JJ: Paintings can proclaim their sense of three
course one does learn, and skills do develop, and dimensionality more easily than drawings can.
innocence is compromised.
R S: In any case, do the drawings allow you to

RS: If every medium has its resistant features, concentrate on and perhaps conceptualize a motif
aspects that one never controls fully, do you or a kind of visual pun because you've gotten it
reassert yourself by mixing mediums? Not only all down somehow to a truly two-dimensional
do you juxtapose oil and encaustic in a painting, medium? Do certain visual and conceptual things
it's not unlike you to combine ink and water happen only because you "reduce"-translate, con
color and pastel and who knows what in a draw vert,ifyou prefer-onemedium to another?
ing. If you combine mediums, does the
combination become yours, even if none of the JJ:Yes.
individual mediums is yours?
R S: You have a Bridget Riley drawing (Fig.
JJ: I am uncomfortable with this language of pos 14),21 a relatively early one, it seems. It looks as
session. One may combine mediums to examine if she's testing out a combination of optical and
experiencesof continuityand discontinuityor graphiceffects-or using the graphic to get at
290
K -. - a) - --- 4 - - 1 - - 1 0 ~i.1-- t Jis * w~t
1 J~r8.; 4,= , Figure 14
BRIDGET RILEY
Untitled,1965
Collection ofjasper
I--
-{;4-- --
-;-i--+t,
0-;
-4-. .__ (? 2006
Johns
Bridget Riley/All
_.___t----- - - i /_ l Resered)
Rights
I I , , 1,ja1.S
I 1 ,. ;
! is-v W ir , 7 : 6 : 5XS S431

1- . .~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~74
' 1 l ,'':' ~~~~~~~~~~.'1- ;,4kw.t

-~ -;1 1I
.1~~_ ___ _ . ____ _ _ _ _ _ _ __

_ _' ' _- Bitr;g.
t5G4,'
. .:.
....
.0.._.. ..
the optical. I wonder if the attraction for you R S: Well, she seems to be saying that in her
here was a certain kind of optical illusion early works she was trying to set up some kind
optical illusion in its essence, in a "reduced" a singlecoordinated
of grandperceptualsituation,
form that allows it to be scrutinized. You've cer effect. She seems to be tolerating a certain degree
tainly investigatedillusion yourself,although of fragmentation-alotof little movements,per
fromRiley.
quite differently haps never fully resolved into a single rhythm. I
wonder if there'ssomethingof thatsortgoing
JJ:One of the most attractive things about her on in your case, because any one of your draw
work is the clarity of thought that it displays. ings is likely to bring a number of different for
And that is matched by an insistent clarity of mal and gestural motifs into proximity, but not
execution. necessarilyto let themsettleinto fixed,rational
order. In a way, they are just sensations. And
RS: Did you know thatBridgetRiley entitled then they aren't-because you do order things.
an interview she gave in 1990 "According to
Sensation," because she wanted to answer your JJ:Don't you see that kind of incoherence and
question,"AccordingtoWhat?"22 order even in Cezanne? I have a strangely angu
lar drawing by Matisse (Fig. 15),3 where nothing
JJ: I don't think my title has a question mark, quite fitstogetheranatomically-that'sits inter
but I'm happy with a reply. est-I think of it asMatisse's misunderstanding of
291
9~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~A A
'I~ ~ ~ ~~~~~A
N~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~J
Picasso. I don't know that we can use any of images and marks to which the rest of us pay
Figure 15
order,composition, scant attention-features
thesetermsveryeffectively: or qualities likewhat
HENRI MATISSE You see one thing,and happens to a line when it just trails off, when
coherence,incoherence.
Reclining Nude, I see somethingelse. it's no more than a squiggle that ceases to squig
1925-27 gle, as if the person drawing it had lost touch
Collection ofJasper RS: I suppose we don't always have words for with it, or perhaps lost interest in it, or had no
Johns (c 2006
what we see.We have words forwords. Do poets need to pursue it further. In other words, a line
SuccessionH.
Matisse, Paris! make more sense talking about drawing than our that isn't much more than an idle doodle-but
Artists Rights art critics do? Because a poet may feel less of an for you, it becomes a strangely expressive mark.
Society [ARS],
New York)
obligationto evaluateand provide reasons. And then you do something with it.... In one
of your works that I've never seen before, you
jj: Much of the time, poets are our critics. drew a branch of leaves in pastel using a circu
lar sheet of heavy paper-a tondo (Fig. 16).24
R S: Sometimes I think thatwhat always inter How can you say that you don't really know
ests you first is the natural way to do something. how to invent or draw from nature when you
You become very conscious of the kinds of can draw like this?
292
Figure 16
JASPER JOHNS
Untitled, 2001
Collection of the
Artist (? 2006
JasperJohns!
VAGA, New York)
293
jj: I've only drawn somethingthateveryone and the Cezannes in your living room. Who did
knows how to draw. Everyone can draw leaves. thatdrawing?
They're schematic by nature and every child is
able to represent them. JJ: I've had that since 1952. A child did it. It's
by "John,"apparently.
RS: I see what you mean. We're back in the
realm of things to which people pay little inves R S: I would have thought this was a case of
tigativeattention,because they'realreadywell naive, outsider art, not children's art. It's too
known. But for you, there's more to know, isn't sophisticated in its crudeness, too good to be
there? You're always finding out more about children'sart.
what you (and we, and even the children) already
know. Some of the new Bushbaby drawings have JJ:
You haven't seen enough children'sart.
such a phenomenally soft-perhaps I should call
itvelvety,or even dampened-appearance (e.g., R S: Well, I saw this a few years ago when you
Fig. 17).25 It looks as if your lines and textures lent it to theDrawing Center inNew York, and
are revealing something unusual about the nature I thought it was as good as anything in that
of the paper. room. How did you get this drawing?
JJ: This one was made on Japanese paper, but JJ: In Columbia, South Carolina, while I was sta
others related to itwere made on fine old paper tioned at Fort Jackson during 1951 or '52, I vis
that I acquired from the estate of an artistwho ited a children's class taught by Catharine
was concerned with such qualities. It seemed Rembert, a former teacher of mine. She had
foolish to keep the paper in storage, as I had given each child a mirror so that self-portraits
done for years, and I decided towork with some could be produced. I thought John's drawing was
of it. touching and beautifully articulate, and I asked
if I might have it. Stupidly, I neglected to get
RS: And so you end up working with its par his full name.
ticularqualities.Analogously, does size affect
quality? What does it feel like to draw on a very RS: Jasper, a few years ago you told Richard
large surface, like your Diver drawing now at Field that as an artist you wanted "to do some
MOMA (Fig. 18 and front cover), which is over thing a little more worthwhile than oneself."28
seven feet high?26 Is it a very different experi This is an intriguing thought, one that seems
ence from drawing on one of the standard-size linked to a perennial dream of modernist prac
sheets? Size must be something that gives you tice-to make a work that gets beyond the nar
no great problem, that hardly causes you pause. row limitations of personal identity or ethnic
Or does it? identity or class identity or gender identity, that
reaches an audience who may have little in com
JJ:The Diver drawing was made in the scale of mon with the creative individual. When you
the human body while I was trying to determine draw-and, for thatmatter, when you work as
how Imight represent a swan dive in a large paint a painter, sculptor, or printmaker-so much of
ing, so its size was determined by literal consid what you do seems to speak to the medium, as
erations. I never thought of it as a problem. if the physicality and range and potential of the
medium were directing the project rather than
RS: It may be blasphemy, but I'm as taken with your own desires, your own ego, otherwise pre
the little pencil portrait on your studio wall (Fig. sumably in charge. I'm struck by the way you
19)27 as I am with theDe Koonings in your study think about accidents, both the ones that artists
294
Figure 17
JASPER JOHNS
Bushbaby,2005
Collection of the
Artist (? 2006
JasperJohns!
VAGA, New York)
295
296
Opposite
Figure 18
JASPER JOHNS
Diver, 1962-63
New York,MOMA
(? 2006Jasper
Johns!VAGA,
New York)
Figure 19
ANONYMOUS
Self-Portrait of a
Young Boy,
c.1951-52 K
Collection of
JasperJohns
works and theones thatbefall say,his or her own helplessness?

stagewithin their
theworks. You don't make a tightdistinction
between thesetwo typesof events,because cer JJ: I don't really know. And I don't want my
tainmediums are accidentprone and othersare languageto become too high-flown. What I do
not. "If you do this, this happens," you said in seems closer to the life of a laborer than to a
1989, bringingattentionback towhat's inherentChinese poet. Yet, one hopes for something
to the medium.29 It seems to me that your resemblingtruth,some sense of life,even of
approachto studiowork eliminatesthedilemma grace, to flicker, at least, in the work. And oth
of choosingeitherto exercisecontrolor to cede ers show and have shown that such possibilities
control. Is this how an artist can get beyond his exist.
or her own narrowness, his or her own psycho
or, as you
logicalneeds and social limitations, Sharon, Connecticut, 25 August and 1 October 2005
297
NOTES
1. Oil on paper, mounted on canvas; 565 x 768 mm. 16. Pencil on paper; 305 x 180 mm. Photo: Dorothy
Photo: Michael Fredericks. Zeidman.
2. Graphite and cont? crayon or charcoal on paper; 616 x 17. Pencil on paper; 314 x 157 mm. Photo: Michael
473 mm. Photo: Dorothy Zeidman. Fredericks.
3. Ruth Fine and Nan Rosenthal, "Interview with Jasper 18. Pen and brown ink, over faint traces of black chalk;
Johns" (22 June 1989), in Nan Rosenthal and Ruth E. 259 x 211 mm. Photo: Dorothy Zeidman.
Fine, The Drawings ofJasper Johns, exh. cat.,Washington,

19. Pencil on tracing paper; 156 x 149 mm. Photo: Michael
DC, National Gallery of Art, 1990, pp. 69-83.
Fredericks.
4. See Washington, DC, 1990, p. 70.
20. Ink on mylar; 446 x 716 mm. Photo: Dorothy Zeidman.
5. Ibid.
21. Gouache and pencil on graph paper; 343 x 442 mm.
6. Jasper Johns, statement inWalter Hopps, "An Interview Photo: Michael Fredericks.
with Jasper Johns," Artforum, 3, 1965, pp. 32-36; reprint
22. See Bridget Riley, "According to Sensation: In
ed in Kirk Varnedoe, ed., Jasper Johns: Writings,
Conversation with Robert Kudielka" (1990), inRobert
Sketchbook Notes, Interviews, New York, 1996, p. 112.
Kudielka, ed., The Eye's Mind: Bridget Riley, Collected
7. Painting: Three Flags, 1958 (New York, Whitney Writings, 1965-1999, London, 1999, pp. 114-20. The
Museum of American Art, inv. no. 80.32 [Fiftieth title refers to Johns's six-panel painting According to
Anniversary Gift of the Gilman Foundation, Inc., The What, 1964 (private collection).
Lauder Foundation, A. Alfred Taubman, an anonymous
23. Pencil on paper; 260 x 328 mm. Photo: Michael
donor, and purchase]), encaustic on canvas (three lev
Fredericks.
els), 78.4 x 115.6 x 12.7 cm. Drawing: Three Flags, 1959
(London, Victoria & Albert Museum, inv. no. 135 24. Watercolor and pastel on paper; diam.: 661 mm. Photo:
1966), pencil on paper, 368 x 508 mm. Dorothy Zeidman.
8. Richard Serra, "About Drawing: An Interview" (inter 25. Watercolor, graphite pencil, and collage on Japanese
view conducted by Lizzie Borden, 1977), in Richard paper; 987 x 692 mm. Photo: Bill Jacobson.
Serra, Writings, Interviews, Chicago, 1994, p. 53.

26. Inv. no. 377.2003.a-b (Partial gift of Kate and Tony
9. Serra, "Notes on Drawing" (1987); see Serra 1994, p. Ganz inmemory of their parents, Victor and Sally Ganz,
181. and in memory of Kirk Varnedoe; Mrs. John Hay
Whitney Bequest Fund; gift of Edgar Kaufmann, Jr. [by
10. Graphite and ink on paper; 71.1 x 106.7 cm. Photo:
exchange] and purchase; acquired by the Trustees of the
Dorothy Zeidman.
Museum ofModern Art inmemory of Kirk Varnedoe).
11. Graphite pencil on paper; 616 x 492 mm. Photo: cour on paper, mounted on
Charcoal, pastel, and watercolor
tesy of Matthew Marks Gallery. canvas; two panels, 2.21 x 1.82 m. Photo: Digital image
? The Museum of Modern Art/Licensed by SCALA/
12. Johns, statement to Newsweek (31 March 1958); see
Art Resource, NY.
Varnedoe (ed.) 1996, p. 81.
27. Pencil and crayon on paper; 426 x 292 mm. Photo:
13. Johns, interview by Amei Wallach (22 February 1991);
Dorothy Zeidman.
see Varnedoe (ed.) 1996, p. 261.
28. Johns, interview by Richard Field (23 April 1999), audio
14. Ink on 107.0 x 83.8 cm. Photo:
plastic; Dorothy
tape transcript, unpublished (courtesy Pdchard Field).
Zeidman.
29. See Washington, DC, 1990, p. 74.
15. Pencil on paper; 315 x 146 mm.
298

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Flicker in the Work

Author(s): Jasper Johns and Richard Shiff

JASPERJOHNS IN CONVERSATION WITH RICHARD SHIFF

JJ: I don't remember the form of it. It was a

R S: When Ruth and Nan asked about your early

JJ:Most of us have an underlying sense of help

JJ:The play between the image and the physi

R S: I know that you've remarked on the won

JJ:The complexity of his work and its straight

R S: You have that terrific self-portrait drawing

JJ:And a portrait of Madame (Fig. 9),16 and one

R S: The drawing you have of Mme Cezanne

dismissed him? Or, to the contrary, did he real Self-Portrait,

RS: We could say that of you too, of course.

PAUL CtZANNE PAUL CtZANNE

Portrait ofMine Portrait of a Child

R S: In any case, do the drawings allow you to

! is-v W ir , 7 : 6 : 5XS S431

' 1 l ,'':' ~~~~~~~~~~.'1- ;,4kw.t

.1~~_ ___ _ . ____ _ _ _ _ _ _ __

works and theones thatbefall say,his or her own helplessness?

Fine, The Drawings ofJasper Johns, exh. cat.,Washington,

1966), pencil on paper, 368 x 508 mm. Dorothy Zeidman.

Serra, Writings, Interviews, Chicago, 1994, p. 53.

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