LO O P S A S R E P R E S E NTAT I O N A N D S Y M B O L
The loop and line are among the two strongest forms within Drilon’s abstract works, asserting their presences in many of his canvases. The cobalt blue loop—a strikingly familiar element and marker of identity across Drilon’s body of work through time—for instance makes repeated reappearances in this series across several paintings. Drilon’s personal mode of abstraction can be appreciated on formal, emotional, biographical and symbolic levels. The form of the loop has long remained both a visual and biographical marker for the artist: not merely a decorative element or a stylistic quirk but also a sign and trace of continuity. Beyond being an exercise in playful and flowing form, producing the curve that bends and wounds up around itself can symbolize both beginning and end, and their intense connection to each other. This connection of form and personal philosophy is underscored by how Drilon often employs the loop as a form of automatic painting, where he allows the line to carve its own outline and path on paper or canvas like an undeciphered entry or form of free writing in one’s own visual diary. As an extension of the psyche and the lines that it traces, the loop is also the act of moving on and beyond, yet always within, the spatial and special circumstances of being. As such, it expresses impulses that are subliminal and primordial. Like his dark outlines, this form never entirely disappears even when he turns to other forms in abstraction. The form in the work titled Blue Loop for instance, remains into the sidelines when Drilon explores the use of outlines that resemble figurative elements and the human form.