The Poetry of a Line: Arnold McBay at Pan Café

By: Michael Dirisio

Posted: 12/1/09

Drawing on the mysterious and ineffable for inspiration, Brock's own Arnold McBay has honed his skills as a visual artist, often expressing his interest in the unknown through the simple gesture of a line or mark.
With recent drawings currently on display at Pan Café in St. Catharines, McBay continues to exhibit his unique ability to create poetic gestures through his abstract and expressive drawings.
McBay wastes no time when beginning his works. Rather than mulling over the intricacies of what he will create, he prefers to work intuitively, exploring the possibilities of each medium while immersed in the work.
"I like to work instinctively and improvisationally. I'm really focused on the process of the drawing," said McBay. "I don't like to think too much, especially in the formative stages of drawing. The act, the stroke, the physicality of moving your arm, how things unfold, it's a magical little process."
It is the tangible qualities of the process, combined with the expressive nature of his aesthetic, which interest McBay most. The works communicate his message abstractly, allowing the viewer to have an active role in the dialogue.
"I'm not really interested in content or concepts upfront, because I think that if you're a human being all that is already in there, so it's going to leach out into work, even if you're not thinking about content or concepts, in subtle ways," he said.
It is the subtlety of this communication that creates the mystery in his work. He trusts that both viewer and artist have acquired a certain amount of experience in their life, and knows that these experiences impact both the process of creating and viewing a work. The artist's life, McBay affirms, will always come through in their work.
"I'm one of those stodgy guys who believes that if you live enough life, and you pay enough attention to what's happening around the world and what's in your face, somehow, almost regardless of what you draw, it'll just all come through in a strange way," said McBay.
This natural process of creation can be likened to poetry. McBay draws on a similar act of expression, connoting ideas and questions openly, rather than engaging in didactic monologues. He prefers allusion to solution, with the act of exploration being more important than any destination. It is for this reason that he refers to his work as visual poetry.
"Good poetry, to a large extent, is about the gaps. The things you leave open and in question."
Though the poetic qualities of his work provide a certain link between the drawings and the café exhibition space, since poetry and café seem to go hand in hand, it was the aesthetics of the building that actually attracted him to choose Pan Café for his work.
"I tend to prefer hanging my work in kind of urban places like [Pan Café] if possible. The white box of the public gallery is fine too, but it's a different game altogether," said McBay. "The relationship between the viewer and the work and the artist - 'cause it's a three way deal there - is different. Whereas I think, somehow, when my work's in a room like that, that's been lived in, it somehow feeds differently."
As McBay's work focuses on equivocal expressions, he is very aware of the effects that the surrounding space will have on the experience of the work. Pan Café offered an ideal exhibition space for his work, as the imperfections of the building compliment his work in ways that a neutral gallery space would not.
"There's really rough surfaces in my work. It's rough-edged, raw, kind of rough-and-ready work. It's not pristine stuff, it never has been."
Being that he is working with the mysteries of life, tight, mathematical or geometric drawings do not interest him. His work is not calculative, since it deals with the unknown - with that which cannot be made sense of.
He is quick to point out, however, that many of the titles of his works are much more playful than one might assume. With titles like "How the Universe really works" and "The ghost of reason," certain viewers get the wrong impression.
"Some people read [the titles] and think I'm being pompous, and I quite actually enjoy that, for some reason. My tongue is planted quite often firmly in cheek on a lot of those titles," said McBay.
When addressing such philosophical issues, one often assumes that they must exhibit the academic demeanor of a scholar. He questions this, however, asking why one cannot explore these issues with the playful honesty of a child.
"I'm playing a lot. A lot of artists are scared to use the word play. For me, it is play, to a large extent," said McBay. "I've been drawing since I was four-years-old, and why would you lose touch with that little boy?"
McBay's exhibit is on display, until December 24 at Pan Café at 120 St. Paul St. in St. Catharines.