For a pencil drawing to make its way onto a screen, it needs to undergo considerable transformation. Turning black on white into white on black is an even greater challenge—not to mention when the paper is another colour. In these instances, even more than in the previous ones, you will have to make decisions that go beyond technical skill and dedication.

Drawing is defined by the line, whereas other pictorial formats reject it. This is something that occurs when changing the background colour. In this intermediate situation (see original below), it becomes necessary to determine the behaviour of white, black, the intermediate tones, and the contrasts. The challenge is to preserve the marks and textures as much as possible.

This is how a drawing made twenty years ago gives rise to three digital clones: white on black, black on white, and “original colours, enhanced.” Something has to be done—or at least, this is how I have always thought about it. Originals on paper become something else when they reach the screen, simply because light behaves differently.

I’m sharing this exercise in adapting a message for print or screen. Does the idea of ​​having to adapt the message to the medium resonate with you?

ink and water colors on brown paper – traveling notes 2005

En el desierto la luna
nos absorbió implantando
toda clase de pajarística de
alucinación. Sonaban
los cuadros pada una
exposición en mi cabeza,
cosa bastante grata.

In the desert the moon
absorbed us, implanting
all sorts of bird-like
hallucinations. It sounded
Pictures at an
exhibition in my head,
quite pleasant thing.