Kim and Joan, detail from 11/15/05, colored 10/06/06 (mouseover)

The Conversation
 
In November 2005, Kim Mosley and Joan Lipkin decided to have a daily conversation for nine months. She would write. He would draw. Sometimes, he would write, too. Here's what they had in mind.

Joan:

For my part, I am interested in the discipline of daily writing and conversation and to see how my relationship with another person and with myself unfolds over a period of time. In addition to the text of my own life, I see this as an opportunity to reflect and chronicle what is going on simultaneously in the wider world.

I also want to see what sorts of things our different mediums spark in each other.

This project speaks ideally to my long standing interest in public and civic dialogue. In this piece, I am committed to being as open and honest as I can, even when it means taking tremendous risks and truly exposing myself. I believe that level of honesty and vulnerability, that stripping away at pretense and defensiveness, is where the truest possibilities for communication, growth and art lie.

Joan Lipkin
Thursday, December 22, 2005

Kim:
When I was in college I had a friend who used to say "we must have gone to the same high school" referring to some connection that we seemed to have. She claimed that it was a line from Shakespeare. It was only recently that I was able to do a text search of the old guy and realize that she had pulled a fast one. In any case, I have always believed that understanding has to do with sharing common experiences. Joan and I did actually go to the same high school in Chicago and grew up with many shared experiences, but we were separated by many years and never knew each other until we met in St. Louis.

I tend to search for ridiculous truisms. The kind that even someone you love will not give you a reason why they are wrong. I'm interested in then formulating an argument to show that they are true. Sometimes in the drawings, I tend to push Joan's buttons with these ridiculous assertions (that I actually believe) and it initiates some interesting discussion (perhaps sometimes more interesting to me and more aggravating to her).

In any case, as this project continues we are starting to synchronize. My drawings are not just about what Joan writes, but they are my reactions as well. In the same way that we respond in a verbal conversation first with an acknowledgment and then with a "but," the drawings are hopefully more than illustrations but rather dialogue.

This collaboration is for me an opportunity for growth. Working together, we are creating a gestalt where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. I do not know exactly where the work comes from, though I'm glad that my drawings come out of my pens the way they do. I do know that the connection between Joan and me has been an inspiration.

Kim Mosley
Friday, December 23, 2005

Next