Terry Winters: Local Group

The first place the reader encounters text in this book of assertive graphite drawings is its next-to-last page. There’s no title, no table of contents, and no introduction–it’s all drawings from the front cover straight through to “Afterwords 101, A Short Answer Quiz” by Francine Prose. Prose rises to meet Winters’s work with an homage that is art in itself, an unconventional, sweet, funny poem evoking the artist’s symbol language and his ideas, and analyzing them even as it mocks that assignment. One question reads “By what signs are the following recognized?” The list, in order, is a blob, a lump, a smudge, a mistake, an intention, and an egg. It’s both sharp and mysterious, and it’s insightful enough to bring readers back to page one seeking answers.