Targets

I’ve been drawing what I’ve been calling “Jasper Johns Inspired Targets” for a little over a month. For those of you who are not in the know, Jasper Johns is an American artist whose art had a foot in both the abstract expressionist and pop art movements of the 1950’s and 1960’s. He was perhaps most famous for his encaustic paintings of flags and targets.

Target (1961)
Encaustic and newspaper on canvas
Chicago Institute of Arts

Target (1961) - Detail
Encaustic and newspaper on canvas
Chicago Institute of Arts

Creating my own target pictures has been a soothing or even meditative experience for me. While this is the case for me anytime I sit down to create a drawing or a painting, it has felt even more so with these images. I think it’s because there isn’t anything complicated about their composition. They’re simple. They’re symmetrical. Circles, or “circle-ish”, shapes have always been appealing to me anyway. Creating them has been like walking a labyrinth in that my mark making tool has only one path to follow. My mind is freed up to think about color and texture. I wonder if this is what drew Jasper Johns to this imagery?

Target (2 23 2025)
Digital image created with the Sketchbook app

Target (2 27 2025)
Digital image created with the Sketchbook app

Things have been a bit “crazy” for me over the course of the last month and a half. My time, attention and energy have been taxed/tested. I got the flu in early February which ended up feeling very much like the first time I got COVID in that, after I got over the initial illness and went back to work, I was plagued with a nagging cough and an unrelenting fatigue for more than a month afterwards. On top of this, while I’ve known for a while that I was going to retire at the end of this school year, I finally filed my paperwork with my school district about my intention to do so a month ago. Making my decision official flipped a switch inside me. I started thinking more about everything I need/want to do to properly leave my career intellectually, emotionally and even physically. The list of things that I want to take care of over the next 2 ½ months has been growing longer.

Target (2 24 2025)
Digital image created with the Sketchbook app

Target (2 28 2025)
Digital image created with the Sketchbook app

I don’t feel that worried or concerned. I believe I’m doing what I need to do to take care of myself during this time. This, I think, is where the targets come in. Creating drawings of concentric circles or “circle-ish” shapes has felt oddly nurturing for me in a way that creating the other things I’ve created hasn’t been. Maybe this is exactly what I needed!