He’s not just writing his name: Brian Hart’s light drawings are serious works of art

He’s not just writing his name: Brian Hart’s light drawings are serious works of art

by Kristoffer Tigue

Brian Hart has been drawing since he was a child. When his family took him to the public library, he’d always check out how-to-draw books. By the time he was 15, he was savoring the full works of Picasso and Gjon Mili’s extra-exposed photography. Born in St. Paul, he moved to Sioux City, Iowa with his family when he was six years old. In 2005 he decided to move back to his home state, finding residence in Minneapolis, and has showcased his incredibly textured light drawings at the Cult Status Gallery and the Future Presence Gallery.

An almost serendipitous discovery, Brian started playing around with his phone screen while exposing it to his Digital SLR, when he realized he could do much more with ultra-exposed photography—physically manipulating small LED lights to draw on his camera in the same way that photographers have been taking those cityscape photos with the blurred car lights on the highway. It started with writing his name but has moved onto some pretty incredible pictures. I met Brian at the Star Bucks inside the downtown Minneapolis Target shopping center because we both love corporations. It was like hosting an interview inside some sort of corporate turducken. Good coffee, too.

Kristoffer Tigue: When did you realize this was something you could do? How did you discover Light Drawing?

Brian Hart: One of my first jobs was working in a public library and re-shelving books. Which was great for me I’ve always been kind of more of an introvert. When I was really young, like between eight and twelve, every time I went to the library it’d be like how to draw a horse or how to draw cartoon characters—how-to-draw books.

I didn’t do much else, but draw. I was very like, kept to myself.

I remember seeing Gjon Mili. He was a photographer for Light Magazine. He went to Picasso sometime in the early to mid part of last century, in the 40s maybe. He showed Picasso these images he was taking of figure skaters he would attach lights, tiny lights, which back in the 40s I don’t know how they were powered, but he would attach tiny incandescent lights to figure skaters. Their feet and their arms and everything. And then would take slightly longer exposures, not super long exposures, but longer exposures of them showing their movements and everything. And he showed them to Picasso and Picasso right away was like ‘Oh, this is great, we should do this.’ He was like ‘I want to do a drawing for you.’ So, while they’re always known as Picasso’s Light Drawings they were Gjon Mili’s photographs. That’s the first time I ever saw those images.

I disc golfed a lot in college. One of my friends told me about these tiny lights that you could get and tape on your discs and play at night. Something, I remember, totally changed. It was the idea like ‘oh, you can make drawings with your camera’ but it was more than just that. [With my phone] I was like, ‘well I’m going to try and draw a face.’ And it was awful, but I was getting really energized by it.

When I got back from that trip I had the little lights [for disc golfing]. And then I just started making this body of work.

How do you prevent capturing the movements of the people or yourself in the drawing from being too noticeable?

That is a very popular question and it just baffles me, because that question would go away if you just did one. It’s just so dark. We draw in black environment with no light, and sometimes very low light.

But I’ve seen certain ones outside where you can see the moon, you can see a background, it’s minimalized. I’m surprised by how much I can’t see you guys.

I guess as far as that goes, I’m a little surprised, too. And it’s not like we ever go out intentionally with like dark clothing. Some people do, and it does go further to hide them more.

In your Hands series, you have to memorize up to 24 different photographs—many that require precise placement to make the complete image. How difficult is that process and how many takes did you find yourself doing until you got it right?

There’s a lot of work, there’s a lot of planning, and so that’s pretty tough. Specifically with the Hands series, when I did those that was over two nights in my apartment before I had air conditioning and it was getting really hot.

So you didn’t do many takes, then?

No, and I really rarely do second takes or third takes or kind of like work to perfect it. I like the humanness in the lines, how it looks hand drawn. So, I like scraggily, I like the imperfection.

That’s cool. It reminds me of The Black Keys. They don’t like to do a lot of takes on their recording. They like the idea of it sounding like it wasn’t polished, like, completely polished.

Yeah, and I like that, too.

“[adam become sun]” is probably one of my favorites. How did you go about making that one?

My friend Adam, just this like crazy positive dude, like so happy all the time. Adam spins fire pouy. [He] broke his stuff out and I was like ‘oh, I want to photograph you doing that.’ The only direction I gave Adam, that I can remember, was just being like ‘try not to move too much, try and keep it contained to a sphere.’

How long did you expose it for?

Three to five minutes.

So, do you have a favorite of yours?

Well, Lauren [Matysik, my girlfriend], and I did that one recently when she’s on the couch. I really like that one.

Are there any local artists that you’ve been digging that you think we should also be digging?

Joe Aschebrock. I love his painting style. Very abstract. All his composition, and a really good guy on top of it.

Alex Kuno. He shapes wood, adding things on top of it. He like dances on this line of super fucking creepy and really masterfully done paintings.

Laura Stack. Her paintings are so beautiful.

And all these street [artists], like EleventhWonder. All these kids who are doing illegal work most of the time, but great, it’s awesome.

I thought I saw you did collaboration with Eric Reiger (Hot Tea)?

Not yet. I want to and I think he wants to, so that’s really exciting the shit out of me. He just got done with that instillation at 35th and Chicago.

What’s next for your drawings?

Serious light drawing work on film. I’ve always known, and I can’t wait to see exactly how, that light will react differently on film than it does on digital.

If you want to check out Brian’s work in person, he’s holding two gallery openings in Lowertown St. Paul on September 7—one at Air Sweet Air and the other at Echo Arts.

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