In 2005 artist Craig Prehn packs up his car on a whim (like a bad relationship kind of whim, he says), drives west, settles in near the Rainbow Grocery in the Mission District, and starts to do pen and paper drawings of the images floating in his head.
There’s “The Farmer,” a drawn, middle-aged man looking nakedly hungry; “The Cat Lady,” an elderly woman with a hard-to-shake, knowing cat; and “Hotel Room,” a portrait of a young woman who evokes an Andrew Wyeth, “Christina’s World” depth. Disturbing but mesmerizing.
These are among the 11 pen-and-paper drawings on display in 33-year-old Prehn’s An American Western show that opened Thursday at Four Barrel Coffee at 375 Valencia St.
I didn’t like all of them. There was something oddly askew about the mouths on “The Couple” and “The Girl”—comical without being funny or evocative. I asked Prehn, who was at the opening, about them. He paused and said he’d never really thought about the mouths as off.
“I like the idea of expression,” he said, looking toward the drawings. “And a mouth is an easy way to exploit body language.” Fair enough.
Dallas Hayns, a 20-year-old Mission native who goes to City College and is finishing up his first film, SF Stories, couldn’t decide if his favorite was “Fish” or “The Farmer.” His friend Nami Kurita, who will be going to school for graphic arts next year, liked both. “They’re very sensitive, detailed,” she said.
Nearby, on a stool at Four Barrel’s front window, Prehn watched the couple looking at the drawings. In part, he said, the series is about how people “end up here from other places.” And autobiography. A detailed drawing, “Box Car”—a favorite of another viewer—comes from Prehn’s childhood and his father’s life.
Prehn, who studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, said he made the frames from shipping pallets. “It’s about the idea of the West, of building something out of what you find; things coming from a different place,” he said.
Definitely worth seeing, the drawings sell for $600 to $1,500.
Craig Prehn: An American Western
Sun., 8am-8pm, and Mon.-Sat., 7-8pm. Four Barrel Coffee, 375 Valencia St. www.fourbarrelcoffee.com