sumi ink

At some point this past spring I began playing with Sumi ink on the wrong king of paper.  It created an interesting accident.  I've been using Arches 88 (a super absorbent silk screen paper) while pouring ink.  Once I pour the ink onto the surface I have to move quickly but can manipulate the direction and flow of the ink wash.  Each time there is a pause in the flow of ink the paper pulls part of the pool into itself and creates a line or a ring (I'm not really sure what to call them). I can keep moving the ink or let the ink absorb into the paper.  The more I move the puddle the greater the initial mark.  The slower I work the more saturated the ink becomes. A nice thing I've discovered about these two media--Archess 88 has no size & Sumi ink is water soluable--you can pour water onto the initial mark and release some of the ink that has steeped into the paper.  These subsequent washes create a pretty dynamic secondary and tertiary mark. One that is controllable too and similar to the first.  I wonder if this is a kind of representation of brewing tea?
The drawings themselves are pretty interesting too: they tend to have an anthropomorphic quality-one that leans toward a substructure.  But there is an uncanny demonic sensibility in them as well.  Oddly they remind me of Baudelaire's Fleur du Mal.  I can't seem to stop comparing contemporary life to the unsavory, and Baudelaire was after all its champion.
This one image is a little sweet.  When I was working on the Alphabet of Stars I kept telling myself I would stop when I found the Unicorn in shape.  I stopped before i found it, but I was very much reminded of it in this drawing. Perhaps it should be titled In Search of the Unicorn.