Shoosty The Art of Music
2017 - 2022
Stephen Shooster, aka Shoosty™, is a Fine Artist with over 50 years of experience. His gesture draw- ings on the subject of music are remarkable for their inventiveness. When asked how he comes up with his ideas, he says, “What makes these drawings
Shooster is a trained Fine Artist and graduate of The Uni- versity of Florida, College of Art. He spent many years drawing live models. During those sessions, he mainly worked with newsprint and charcoal. The idea behind the simple inexpensive materials is to stay loose and fluid while
special is the music itself. I may have been moving my hand but the music was driving the patterns. These draw- ings could never have been created in a quiet studio. It is actually the music that you see.” I have seen him make these drawings. He finds a spot and waits. When the band starts playing, he starts drawing. When they stop, he stops. It’s a whirlwind of ac- tivity. The result can at first seem messy, and hard to sort out, but it has a sort of energy that is compelling to study. He cleans up his drawings back at the studio where he digitizes them using vectors to completely redraw the final work. Once completed, the musicians jump into fo- cus with precision and clarity.
feeling out the composition. During these ses- sions, he was taught to use ovals to find the shapes and then tune those into the pose. All of the poses were timed, 2, 5, 10, and 30 min- utes, respectively. Shoosty was trained to work fast. While making the Art of Music, Shoosty devi- ates from his formal training by using squares instead of ovals. I asked him why he is using squares and he simply stated they are faster. The result is a hard edge that sometimes be- comes a cube which then builds like virtual wooden sculptures.
NUDE DESCENDING A STAIRCASE (NO. 2) 1912 MARCEL DUCHAMP
Shoosty also loves cubism, and since the mu- sicians have a lot of energy and keep moving around, he frequently gives them two noses, three hands, and legs like in Duchamp’s paint- ing, Nude Descending a Staircase (No. 2). Open the pages and immerse yourself in another world, The Art of Music, by Shoosty.
Within these pages are examples of Shoosty’s orig- inal drawings side-by-side with his digital work so you can see the transition.
Albert Angel, Amateur Art Historian
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