In early 2020 I moved back to Baltimore after almost 10 years in New York. My friend from middle school asked me to help him empty out his grandfathers storage space. We spent all day clearing out furniture and objects that had accumulated since the 1960’s. The grandfather had owned and operated a pawnshop for several decades. I found a box of stationary paper from the business along with graphite transfer paper that was used to write receipts. Since then I have been making transfer drawings on this paper, thinking about diamonds, jewelry, furnishings, appliances—about the exchange of these objects for cash—about Baltimore—about broken pots from thousands of years ago—about time and money—about building a home. The grandfather died a few years after we cleared his storage units. I only met him that one time and it feels strange and interesting to consider his life, his work, his accumulation, as I work on these drawings until his stationary runs out. So far there are around two hundred drawings.
