LOCUST JONES ‘MAGIC Sauce’ at DRAW Space 

May 17, 2024

Locust Jones will create a large-scale drawing at ‘DRAW Space’ on 1.06.23 from 5pm as part of the exhibition ‘MAGIC Sauce’. Usually taking as his impetus the ever-brewing storm of information in which news and current affairs are produced and consumed, on this occasion Locust will draw directly in the space, creating a counterpoint to the news stream. The artist says: “this is a turn towards the primacy and intimacy of drawing as a means of clearing the slate, of purging the toxicity of negative news through the delivery of a durational drawing performance.” Locust will be accompanied by drumming by musician Tim Bruniges. The exhibition will run from 1.06. – 2.07.23.

An excerpt from the exhibition essay by Lisa Pang (Lisa Sharp) reads: “In his own words, his is a practice centred around a maelstrom: the depiction of a world slowly going to hell. Mired in the looping language and frenzied imagery of endlessly cycling news production and consumption, the artist wades across viscous outpourings of current affairs and his response? Why, to spray it back, in personal translation, across multiple mediums. With drawing sticks in hand, bodily, and audibly, his response to the daily news is multifaceted but also recognisably idiomatic. Accompanied by his own vocal patter and to the rhythm of drumming by Tim Bruniges, through drawings to be made in situ across papered walls and surfaces, Magic Sauce will be a work of many ingredients. It promises to be part drawing, part performance and once over, part echoing residue of what came before. Based on previous drawing-as-performances, this one will be cry out loud, large-scaled, prophetic, sometimes despairing, occasionally awkward, but always bristling with furious energy.”

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Artwork caption: Locust Jones, ‘Forever History’, 2019, ink and pencil paper, 154 x 900cm