Destination
The markings on the sheet of paper were left by broken hair ties soaked in India ink. I stretched them until they snapped, causing them to sling into the air.
Hair ties always break at the seam. I exploited this to manipulate their flightpath so that they consistently hurled toward paper.
For each sheet, I attached the paper to a wooden backboard with painter’s tape. I situated the backboard in the seat of a chair, using its back support to prop the backboard so that it was upright and facing my direction. I stationed the chair and backboard about ten feet away from me.
On my kitchen table, I attached a C-clamp to function as a launch point. The clamp’s fastening mechanism doubles as a sturdy rod. From here I stretched the hair ties. To maximize consistency and to avoid injury, I used a hex wrench as a handle.
I prepared a number of ink baths with different tones and saturations. For each hair tie, I dunked it into an ink bath and quickly looped it over the C-clamp. Here, I made sure to position the seam toward me, away from the canvas, and split evenly across the hex wrench. The seam placement was critical; it is what gave me moderate control over the hair ties’ direction. When I pulled them to their breaking point, their tension was distributed evenly. The result was a fairly accurate shot towards the direction that was opposite from where I pulled. I repeated this process, landing frenetic inky marks on the page, until I felt the composition was complete.