'I don’t make drawings of things − I make drawings about things.'
Jonathan Newdick worked for some years as a designer in Fleet Street before turning to drawing and printmaking in the 1990s. Although he uses a variety of media his work is almost invariably on paper and he has always described it as ‘drawing’. In recent years he has turned his attention to writing (often combined with etching) and has become increasingly interested in the realtionships between word and image, yet, even when he writes, he still regards it as a discipline of drawing.
His work, always to some degree experimental, is nevertheless rooted in tradition and can be found in both public and private collections throughout Europe and the USA. Although he finds travelling a constant source of inspiration it is not something he particularly enjoys, and he never flies, which he sees both as a symptom and a result of the restlessness which pervade our lives. So, when he goes from his home in Sussex to Venice, where he also works, he always travels by train, preferably a slow and indirect one.
"It's all drawing and nothing is finished...
Shakespeare never finished Othello. Or Beckett, Godot. There was a point when they stopped writing but finishing was not their privilege. That right belongs to the audiences who continue their work, and the critics, and the students writing their essays, dissertations. When all that stops, that's when the work is finished. It's the same with drawing. When a drawing ceases to be looked at it ceases to be in production. At that point it can be buried, cremated. At that point it's finished."