Square Alley 2009

Pavlo Makov made this drawing called 'Square Alley', and looking at the surface, it feels like a map, or maybe a memory of one. There's a ghostly grid underlying the whole thing, like a structure trying to hold it all together. The marks are delicate, a bit like pencil, and washed over with a warm, aged tone that feels like you are looking at an old document. The eye drifts through a landscape of spindly trees and boxy buildings. Look at that dog cocking its leg in the upper left! It is funny, but it also makes me think about all the layers of seeing and knowing that go into making a place. This map doesn't feel fixed, more like a loose collection of details. Thinking of memory makes me think of Cy Twombly, but Twombly has more chaos and freedom in his work, where Makov has a sense of melancholy and structure. Art isn't about answers, but about embracing ambiguity.