FLAT

Phlatness

Mike Nesbit

A close-up of a work from Nesbit's "phlatness" series involving a collection of delicate, blue lines, arrows, and numbers, that tangle and congregate towards the upper-left of the image and loosen into more coherent strands on the lower right. Etched onto lithograph paper through a scripted and iterative process.
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in, Photo by Taiyo Watanabe

Phlatness is a series of drawings that I’ve been producing over the past 5 years. There is a collage of techniques used in the work (analog and digital) with an intent of representation of representation. A hand drawing is produced representing an object and then a digital drawing is produced of the hand drawing instead of the original object. The assembly line of this iterative drawing process is intended to remove or flatten any meaning tied to the original object and allow the representation to move forward and be judged at “face-value”. The Digital drawings are then printed through an analog process of offset lithography where repetition and iteration are used to further enhance the intent of that process. Along with the drawings there is an Abstract Technical description of the “Phlatness Theory” intended to be broken down to its basic terms to understand the judgement behind the work.

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A contained overview of a work from Nesbit's "phatness" series involving a collection of delicate, parametric black lines, arrows, and numbers that concentrate towards the top right in the shape of a rupturing parabola opening downwards. The background is white.
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in
A contained overview from the series comprised of straight lines of varying shades of grey that radiate from the top left. Some lines are adorned at the ends with perpendicular, smaller lines causing them to resemble rooftop antennas. The background is white and there is ample negative space from the bottom right to the middle right region.
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in
A contained overview from the series composed of fine shades of grey lines and numbers that aggregate towards the lower center
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in
A swarm of black fine lines that concentrate towards the center left of the canvas and occasionally are entangled with fine cyan lines. The aggregate of lines in certain edges of the overall form blend to become fuzzy
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in, Photo by Jasmine Park
A close up from the series that show black and blue lines of varying thicknesses with annotations and arrows. Some lines have more distinct curves and contours while others form a contorted grid
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in, Photo by Jasmine Park
A tangle of blue lines that drawn in immeasurable directions and reiterate over black and grey lines. Some end with arrows.
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in, Photo by Jasmine Park
Vertical beige canvas with a nested rectangular overlay. The overlay starts black with a tint of blue and runs 2/3rds down the overlay. The remaining overlay is visually split and a charcoal-like texture concentrates downwards until fading back to the beige canvas. Where the overlay is split, thin blue lines form an abstract design running upwards towards the darker concentrations of the overlay.
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in, Photo by Jasmine Park
A tilted close-up of fine black lines. At the top left corner, the lines form iterative u-shaped curves that move towards the right of the canvas and end mid-way the image. There is a shallow depth of field tothe image that focus in on these curves and blur out towards the right of the image.
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in, Photo by Taiyo Watanabe
A close-up of fine blue lines concetrated towards the upper left of the photograph and loosen as they move towards the bottom right corner. The lower left and upper right corners are blurred from the shallow depth of field.
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in, Photo by Taiyo Watanabe
A close-up of fine black lines that are closely concentrated towards the upper right of the image. As the extend downwards, the lines loosen and the image becomes out of focus.
Mike Nesbit, 2014
lithograph 22 in x 28 in, Photo by Taiyo Watanabe
A vertical series of images that display black san-serif text recognizably from the English language that resembles an annotation format.

About the Artist

Mike Nesbit is an LA-based fine artist who likes to produce work through community engagement within and outside California. Nesbit’s ability to engage local museums, institutions, design organizations, and media outlets allows his ambitious artworks to become collaborative realities, transforming his art into objects that contain a sense of shared pride and ownership with the communities involved in their manufacturing and maintenance.

With a background in architecture, his multidisciplinary skill-set greatly informs his artwork, allowing Nesbit to bridge the worlds of art and architecture with a focus on technique, repetition, and space. Nesbit has participated in solo and group shows across the country. His long-term installation FLOOD in Omaha, NE, recently won the 2018 IIDA Great Plains Chapter Interior Design Excellence Award, the 2018 ACI Nebraska Award of Outstanding Achievement, and the 2018 national PCI Award for Industry Advancement. Furthermore, Nesbit was selected to be a featured artist for the JW Marriott’s documentary series on Downtown L.A. culture.

His current large-scale sculptural exhibit THE BLUES is on view at The Black Contemporary in Ames, Iowa until April 2019. He received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from the Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles and worked closely with Thom Mayne of Morphosis for five years, recently completing Mayne’s personal home as his project Architect. Previous, to Art and Architecture Nesbit, played professional baseball with the Seattle Mariners.