Mood Drawings (2024)

Installation View, Ben Weiner: Mood Drawings, Mark Moore Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA

August 24, 2023 (Ondas de Luz), 2024, ink on chromatography paper soaked in Claritin solution, 40 x 30 inches

Detail, August 24, 2023 (Ondas de Luz), 2024, ink on chromatography paper soaked in Claritin solution, 40 x 30 inches

Installation View, Ben Weiner: Mood Drawings, Mark Moore Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA

December 26 2022, 2023, ink on chromatography paper soaked in Paxlovid solution, 40 x 30 inches

Weekend 1 (April 8/9 2023), 2024, ink on 2 sheets of chromatography paper soaked in Mezcal and Marijuana solutions , 40 x 60 inches overall

November 24 2019 (Amanecer Interior), 2024, ink on chromatography paper soaked in Marijuana/Kombucha solution, 40 x 30 inches

Weekend 3 (July 16/17 2005), 202, ink on 2 sheets of chromatography paper soaked in Vicodin and Vodka solutions, 40 x 60 inches overall

Detail, Weekend 3 (July 16/17 2005), 202, ink on 2 sheets of chromatography paper soaked in Vicodin and Vodka solutions, 40 x 60 inches overall

September 5 2023, 2023, ink on chromatography paper soaked in Advil solution, 40 x 30 inches

Weekend 2 (August 6/7 2022), 2024, ink on 2 sheets of chromatography paper soaked in Vodka and Tylenol solutions, 40 x 60 inches overall

December 20 1996, 2023, ink on chromatography paper soaked in Codeine solution, 40 x 30 inches

Week I (April 13-19 2020), ink on 7 sheets of chromatography paper soaked in Vodka, Marijuana, Tylenol, Gin, Advil, Mezcal, and Amoxicillin solutions, 5 x 31.5 inches

May 1 2023 (Colores de ti), 2023, ink on chromatography paper soaked in Advil/Codeine solution, 40 x 30 inches

BEN WEINER: MOOD DRAWINGS AT MARK MOORE FINE ART, LOS ANGELES, CA

Mark Moore Fine Art is pleased to present Ben Weiner: Mood Drawings, an exhibition focused on the artist’s ongoing series of “Diary” drawings. In these alchemical works, Weiner soaks ink-coated chromatography paper in solutions of drugs, resulting in hazy, prismatic abstractions. Inspired by the “drug diaries” patients keep during clinical trials, Weiner made the drawings using substances left from his own daily consumption, so that they constitute a record of his mental states over time. The drugs range from the psychedelic, to the addictive, to the mundane, including Marijuana, Paxlovid, MDMA, Vicodin, Kombucha, Advil, Caffeine, and Mezcal. By couching painterly expressionism within an honest record of his substance usage, Weiner self-critically engages with issues surrounding wellness and mental health.

To make the drawings, Weiner begins by coating the chromatography paper in ink, alternately using a monochrome or multi-colored palette based on his mood. He applies the ink manually, scribbling gestures onto the paper with markers. He then crushes a chosen drug and mixes it with water to create a solution. He soaks the chromatography paper (which is used in labs to identify drugs) in the drug solution, alternately re-soaking it or removing it to dry when he sees a result that moves him. Each drug releases a unique spectrum of colors from the ink, enhancing the marks Weiner has made on the paper. By harnessing these effects, Weiner has developed a signature language of hazy fields permeated by blips and striations, all resulting from his methods of dipping and soaking the paper in his custom tinctures.

Weiner titles each of his drawings with the date on which he consumed the substance it contains. Invoking On Kawara’s date paintings, this archival approach connects art-making with the memory of lived experience. In these drawings, which are Weiner’s largest to date, he has expanded this theme with his first-ever multi-panel works: “Weekend 1 (April 8/9 2023)” is a diptych made with Mezcal and Marijuana, consumed respectively on a Saturday and Sunday. “Week 1 (April 13-19 2020) ” is a 7-part polyptych soaked in 7 drugs used during a highly-medicated week of the 2020 lockdown. These drawings, along with works like “December 26 2022,”-- soaked in Paxlovid left from a bout with COVID– evoke the range of experiences we associate with drug usage, from weekend benders, to self-medication, to isolation and recovery.

While Colorfield painters like Rothko and Frankenthaler are clear precedents for Weiner’s drawings, his choice of drugs as his medium could be seen to deconstruct the very notion of pure expression. The fact that Weiner’s abstractions are “enhanced” evokes a cultural obsession with chemical consumption that permeates virtually every aspect of daily life- from performance-enhancing drugs in sports, to the 90% of Americans that regularly consume caffeine for productivity, to marijuana’s increasing legalization, to the around 10 million people who misuse Codeine annually. Weiner has cited that an inspiration for this series came from his grandfather’s Codeine addiction, which was enabled by physicians attempting to manage his chronic pain.

Thus, while Weiner’s cheeky use of drugs might initially seem to problematize pure expression, it ultimately holds a mirror up to the ubiquity of drugs within the human experience. If anything, Weiner’s use of synthetic chemicals to create organic, meditative, even beautiful images, promotes the possibility of a mindful relationship between ourselves and the substances we can’t help but encounter in daily life.

Detail, November 24 2019 (Amanecer Interior), 2024, ink on chromatography paper soaked in Marijuana/Kombucha solution, 40 x 30 inche