Studies

For Devlin, every project starts with drawing. Alone with her research or in conversations with collaborators, she thinks with a pencil in hand. Annotations on play scripts, opera scores, and ecology books capture her reactions while reading. Quick sketches on the back of performers’ set lists illustrate ideas for concert video projections. Sequences of drawings evolve narratives and iterations for large-scale artworks. Devlin and her studio team progress these concepts into scale models and sculptures. Sometimes these studies map directly to the visuals of a final performance. Other times they preserve trains of thought in miniature. 

Accompanying the works are Devlin’s descriptions of her process.