Craig Quarry 1973

Malcolm Rice made this drawing, Craig Quarry, in 1973. Look closely, and you’ll see how he builds the form with a careful hatching technique. It's like he's slowly coaxing the image out of the paper, one tiny mark at a time. The whole thing is rendered with this delicate touch. You can almost feel the roughness of the stone, even though it's just pencil on paper. See how the light catches on the edges of the blocks, giving them this almost ethereal quality? And the tiny figure standing atop the quarry, like a king surveying his domain. This reminds me of Piranesi, etching his imaginary prisons, or maybe even some of the early Surrealists with their dreamlike landscapes. It’s a reminder that art isn’t always about grand gestures; sometimes, it’s about the quiet accumulation of small, thoughtful marks. It’s about the process as much as the final product, that ongoing conversation between the artist and their materials.