Pencil Strokes Research Articles

My Friend, Loonie by Nina Lacour

Reviewed by: My Friend, Loonie by Nina Lacour Natalie Berglind Lacour, Nina My Friend, Loonie; illus. by Ashling Lindsay. Candlewick, 2023 [32p] Trade ed. ISBN 9781536213935 $18.99 Reviewed from digital galleys Ad 3-6 yrs A little girl gets a present from her moms, “a balloon that floated up and up all the way to the ceiling.” The balloon is enormous and bright yellow with little pink and blue stars hanging off of it, and she promptly dubs it “Loonie.” Loonie quickly becomes a fixture of the family, going with the little girl on walks, having its own seat at the dinner table, and busting a dance move alongside the little girl. A fateful [End Page 226] trip to the outside garden, however, sends Loonie off into the heavens. The girl spends time mourning Loonie, but eventually starts to see yellow in everything and remembers the positive things she learned from their friendship. Dealing with loss and appreciating things while they last are familiar themes explored in picture books, but the stiff writing makes this feel more generic than memorable. More successful are Lindsay’s mixed media illustrations, with marker and color pencil strokes resembling stylized versions of children’s art; that styling gives the little girl ownership of her narrative and the depictions of her feelings—joy at activities with Loonie, sorrow at its absence, and the eventual glimmer of hope—in corresponding vivid or desaturated hues. While the queer couple parenting the little girl will draw some people in, kids who need a lesson on grief can instead turn to James’ Rosemary and Maple (BCCB 3/23) or Mountford’s The Circles in the Sky (BCCB 9/22). Copyright © 2023 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Body-worn enzymatic biofuel cell with automated pencil drawn bioelectrodes for energy harvesting from human sweat

Epidermal bioelectronics is a field of integrated electronic system which consists of conductive materials used in a variety of applications with external energy supply. Arguably, biofuel cells, which can produce energy directly from the physiological environment, are the best power sources for wearable bioelectronics. Optimized electrode materials, which are highly flexible, light-weight and disposable, are an key features to be considered. In this work, a novel method of developing enzymatic bioelectrode using automated pencil strokes for biofuel cell application is discussed. The developed lactate/O2 biofuel cell shows a maximum power density of 11.5 µW cm−2 and 7.8 µW cm−2 in the presence of lactate and human sweat, respectively with high open-circuit voltage. This cost-effective and straightforward electrode fabrication technique delivering enhanced performance without any metallic catalyst is commendable for future wearable devices.

Body-worn Enzymatic Biofuel Cell with Automated Pencil drawn Bioelectrodes for Energy Harvesting from Human Sweat

Abstract Epidermal bioelectronics is a field of integrated electronic system which consists of conductive materials used in a variety of applications with external energy supply. Arguably, biofuel cells, which can produce energy directly from the physiological environment, are the best power sources for wearable bioelectronics. Optimized electrode materials, which are highly flexible, light-weight and disposable, are an key features to be considered. In this work, a novel method of developing enzymatic bioelectrode using automated pencil strokes for biofuel cell application is discussed. The developed lactate/O2 biofuel cell shows a maximum power density of 11.5 µW/cm2 and 7.8 µW/cm2 in the presence of lactate and human sweat, respectively with high open-circuit voltage. This cost-effective and straightforward electrode fabrication technique delivering enhanced performance without any metallic catalyst is commendable for future werable devices.

Sketch Generation with Drawing Process Guided by Vector Flow and Grayscale

We propose a novel image-to-pencil translation method that could not only generate high-quality pencil sketches but also offer the drawing process. Existing pencil sketch algorithms are based on texture rendering rather than the direct imitation of strokes, making them unable to show the drawing process but only a final result. To address this challenge, we first establish a pencil stroke imitation mechanism. Next, we develop a framework with three branches to guide stroke drawing: the first branch guides the direction of the strokes, the second branch determines the shade of the strokes, and the third branch enhances the details further. Under this framework's guidance, we can produce a pencil sketch by drawing one stroke every time. Our method is fully interpretable. Comparison with existing pencil drawing algorithms shows that our method is superior to others in terms of texture quality, style, and user evaluation. Our code and supplementary material are now available at: https://github.com/TZYSJTU/Sketch-Generation-withDrawing-Process-Guided-by-Vector-Flow-and-Grayscale

The New Edith Wharton Studies

The New Edith Wharton Studies

Development of Membraneless Paper‐pencil Microfluidic Hydrazine Fuel Cell

AbstractHerein, a membraneless paper based co‐laminar microfluidic Hydrazine‐Hydrogen peroxide fuel cell, employing graphite pencil electrode, is presented. Hydrogen peroxide has been used as oxidant while sulphuric acid and sodium hydroxide have been employed as electrolytes. The electrodes were formed by manual stroking of graphite pencils. Maximum power output was achieved by examining various combinations of different grades of graphite electrodes on a suitable filter paper with 100 pencil strokes. Here, maximum current density and power density of 14.43 μA/cm2 and 1.30 μW/cm2 respectively were achieved at a stable open circuit potential of 410 mV for 40 mM of hydrazine concentration.

Automated pencil electrode formation platform to realize uniform and reproducible graphite electrodes on paper for microfluidic fuel cells

Graphite pencil stroked electrodes for paper-based Microfluidic devices are gaining immense attention due to their electrochemical properties, cost efficiency, and ease-of-use. However, their widespread use has been hindered by the challenges associated with their manual fabrication such as non-uniformity in graphite deposition, applied pressure, etc. This work presents the design and development of an automated graphite pencil stroking device for graphite electrode fabrication with high efficiency through a compact, inexpensive and automatic process, with reduced fabrication time and human intervention leading to more uniformity. The motion platform of Graphtec plotter was used to create multiple strokes with the help of the proposed device. Such inexpensive graphite electrodes (less than the US $1) have been observed to be porous in nature, acting as diffusion agents. The automated graphite electrodes were used to study the performance of microfluidic paper fuel cells (MPFCs) with formic acid, oxygen, and sulphuric acid acting as fuel, oxidising agent and electrolyte respectively. From this configuration, the maximum current density and power density were measured to be 1,305.5 µA cm−2 and 135.5 µW cm−2, respectively at 0.3 V stable OCP at 100 strokes. Overall, the study enumerates the development of an automated pencil stroke device for fabricating graphite electrodes, which can potentially be harnessed in numerous miniaturized paper based applications.

Hydrogel-filled micropipette contact systems for solid state electrochemical measurements

This paper reports on the use of a novel microcapillary system for solid contact electrochemical measurements. The probe is made of moveable micropipettes, with orifice of 1–30-μm radii, filled with a conducting hydrogel, which forms a thin-gelled meniscus at the pipette end. The hydrogel is made of 2 % (w/v) agarose and water solutions, containing KCl or KNO3 as supporting electrolytes. The micropipette can be brought in contact with a conducting substrate to form a microcell, which allows performing voltammetric measurements confined within limited contact regions. The suitability of the proposed probe for local electrochemical measurements are tested using two electroactive species, dissolved in the hydrogel, namely [Fe (CN6)]4- and Ag+ ions. Mass transport characteristics of the two species, in bulk hydrogel and at micropipette meniscuses of different radii, are examined in detail in the frame of existing theory. For comparison, voltammetric measurements are also performed with micropipettes filled with the corresponding aqueous solutions. It is shown that the gel-filled micropipette, at variance with the aqueous one, prevents the spreading and leakage of solution on the sample surface. The microprobe developed here can be useful to perform electrochemical measurements on surfaces, which suffer from direct contact with liquid electrolytes. A proof-of-concept hydrogel-capillary measurement is performed to distinguish the presence of metallic silver deposited on a graphite-on-paper–based material, realized through simple pencil strokes.

Statistical Performance Analysis and Robust Design of Paper Microfluidic Membraneless Fuel Cell With Pencil Graphite Electrodes

Abstract Paper-based membraneless microfluidic fuel cell (PMMFC) has emerged as an alternative to conventional fuel cells. Extraction of optimum energy yield from these PMMFCs requires selection and study of various design and operating parameters. In this context, this paper presents reliability analysis and robust design of PMMFC composed of air-breathing graphite electrodes using multiple concentrations of formic acid and sulfuric acid as fuel and electrolyte, respectively. Combinations of four different grades of pencils are employed to prepare the electrodes using various pencil strokes. PMMFC is analyzed for two different orientations—horizontal and vertical, and the maximum power outputs were recorded. In order to analyze the combined effects of different factors governing the performance of PMMFC, a statistical approach of full factorial design is utilized to perform analysis of mean (ANOM), analysis of variance (ANOVA), signal to noise ratio (SNR), and desirability study. The response equations in terms of coded values of the factors are also derived. Rigorous desirability study, with the optimized parameters, concludes that the best desirability values for the horizontal and vertical arrangements of PMMFC are 0.8842 and 0.92768, respectively. Overall, this study helps to develop reliable, robust, and efficient PMMFC for many realistic applications.

Performance optimization of microfluidic paper fuel‐cell with varying cellulose fiber papers as absorbent pad

Miniaturization of devices, combined with other features such as portability, proneness to automation, rapid performance, amenability to integration, multiplexing, and cost-effectiveness, is rapidly increasing for various sensing and energy harvesting applications. One such emerging area is the development of microfluidic fuel cell on cellulose papers, which has enormous scope to optimize its performance. This is primarily because such devices eliminate the need for membranes as well as external pumps since they have built-in colaminar flow embedded capillaries. Such peripherals are usually used in conventional microfluidic fuel cells, which are fabricated using methods like photolithography, PDMS lithography, and 3D printing. This paper presents investigations on microfluidic paper–based fuel cells (MPFCs) with different cellulose absorbent pads for their performance optimization. Herein, the MPFC utilizes formic acid as fuel, oxygen from quiescent air as oxidant, and sulfuric acid as electrolyte for conducting ionic exchange under colaminar flow. The electrodes are realized through simple pencil strokes depositing a thin layer of graphite. The porous graphite electrodes act as diffusion agents breathing oxygen directly from the atmospheric air. Such an MPFC configuration, costing less than US $1, was optimized to achieve maximum energy density by examining various combinations of absorbent pads with different grades of cellulose papers. It is seen that the maximum open circuit potential is 0.46 V, while the maximum current and power densities are 1505.66 μAcm−2 and 173.97 μWcm−2, respectively, with a grade 6 absorbent pad. Such performance can be further enhanced by investigating MPFCs with various graphite pencils with a diverse number of strokes at different concentration levels.

"Halmoni" and "Paternal Grandmother"

"Halmoni" and "Paternal Grandmother" Monica Heilman (bio) ARTIST STATEMENT. In this set of portraits, I depict my grandmothers, both living, one residing in South Korea, the other in small town USA. During the pandemic, my mind is frequently on elder family members. These portraits honor and memorialize, while capturing our current reality, when one's likeness is most likely obscured by a mask. Yet the mask is contentious. I am confident that my halmoni must wear one, and almost as confident that my conservative white grandmother does not. In recreating the image of a woman who does not want to see me, I contend with the tensions of a multiracial Asian American identity for which long-standing racism is inseparable from ancestry. [End Page 319] Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 1. Halmoni Deciding on your portrait is easy. Rough pencil strokes that act as pathways for careful ink lines are external expressions of longing. I reference photos I've taken of us, but these are already four years old. So I lean on a more recent photo of you and the daughter you're having difficulty remembering now—my mother—taking note of how the nursing home has dressed you in something akin to a hospital gown. I know that now you must also wear a mask, because you live in a country that acknowledges that public health takes communal effort. I take comfort in that fact, drawing in the shadows of your wrinkles as I wonder if I'll get to see you again. [End Page 320] Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 2. Paternal Grandmother As soon as I decided to do your portrait, I questioned whether I could pull it off. We haven't seen each other in twenty years and, currently quarantined away from my childhood home, I have no photos of you. You hate photos anyway. While Halmoni's portrait leaves warmth, drawing yours highlights an emptiness. I pull on faded memories of your likeness and do a Google image search for "older woman"—no need to specify "white"—for references. I question whether you would even wear a mask, and though I have doubts, draw one across your face, like a benevolent voodoo wish for your safety. Yet I can't help but wonder, given our estrangement and my not-quite-white skin, if you saw me today, features obscured by a mask, would you recognize me or be afraid? [End Page 321] Monica Heilman Monica Heilman is an artist and sociology PhD student at Indiana University Bloomington. Her research interests include race and ethnicity, identity, qualitative methodologies, and arts-based research. Monica's current work explores how multiracial identity is shaped by U.S. racial hierarchies. Learn more about her work at monicaheilman.com and artwork at monicaheilmanart.com. Copyright © 2020 Johns Hopkins University Press

Samuel Wade Levy: Recent Works on Paper

Samuel Wade Levy:Recent Works on Paper Karen Wilkin Samuel Wade Levy's drawings encapsulate experience. They are almost always done directly from the motif, en plein air, in his studio, or through the studio window. (Very occasionally, a plein air or studio drawing will serve as the starting point for another version or a canvas.) Whether he is dealing with a studio set up, a tree, or a mountain in the American West; whether working with pencil, ink, or color; Levy translates perception into mark-making, concentrating not on faithfully rendering what is before him, but rather on creating relationships among touches on the page that not only animate the surface, but also become a metaphor for what Paul Cézanne and Henri Matisse called a "sensation"—the heightened attention demanded by a motif that has, for inexplicable reasons, captured the artist's attention. We recognize and respond to the specifics of the image that Levy has been engaged by, enjoying the complexity and density of a tree's branches or the harsh geometry of bony mountains, revealed by sunlight. But we are equally aware of the physical characteristics of the cumulative pencil strokes or urgent brushmarks before us, conscious of the action of the artist's hand, and even, of the time required for the drawing to reach its current state. Levy allows—encourages—us to think about the history of the drawing's making, providing evidence of all of his interventions on the page, from first to last. We can mentally recapitulate how the evocative image evolved out of the apparently inchoate, spontaneous gestures and smudges that underlie and surround the more lucid, more persistently worked parts. The history of the making of the drawing, with its implications of time passing and gestures repeated, becomes as much a part of its presumed meaning as [End Page 393] its nominal subject. It's as if we were watching Levy at work, following the development of the image before us, as it reached its present state. "Present state" is an operative concept here. Part of the pleasure afforded by many of Levy's drawings is their enlivening instability and contingency: this is what this image looks like now; it looked different in the past and it could look different in the future. We associate this kind of suggestion of the momentary with gestural Abstract Expressionist works, where it often appears to be an end in itself, emblematic of the anxiety and unease that any serious practitioner was supposed to suffer from in the aftermath of World War II and during the Cold War 1950s. Obviously, no such feelings of insecurity are intended or provoked by Levy's works on paper. Quite the contrary, the implied mutability and instability of his gatherings of marks and touches simply animate and enrich his drawings, intensifying our awareness of them as objects made by a particular individual, over a possibly indeterminate period of time. The apparently casual, loose quality of Levy's mark-making heightens the sense that the drawing is coming into being while we watch, lending his work a special kind of intimacy. We can concentrate on the formal and material properties of these lively drawings, at the same time that we can enjoy the vivid sense of place and light they suggest. They make us wonder, as well, whether they might become the sources of canvases at any time, but we rapidly dismiss this thought. Levy's drawings resist being interpreted as studies for works in other mediums. They are vigorous, independent responses to qualities of the light, forms, and textures of the world around us, wholly self-sufficient and complete. [End Page 394] Click for larger view View full resolution Mountain Observation (2018), Graphite and Ink on Paper, 10 3/4" x 8 1/2". © Samuel Wade Levy [End Page 395] Click for larger view View full resolution The Big Pine, no. 3 (2020), Graphite on Paper, 10 1/8" x 7". © Samuel Wade Levy [End Page 396] Click for larger view View full resolution Dark Mountain (2018), Ink on Paper, 7 3/8" x 11". © Samuel Wade Levy [End Page 397] Click for larger view View full resolution...

Pencil Drawing Video Rendering Using Convolutional Networks

AbstractTraditional pencil drawing rendering algorithms when applied to video may suffer from temporal inconsistency and shower‐door effect due to the stochastic noise models employed. This paper attempts to resolve these problems with deep learning. Recently, many research endeavors have demonstrated that feed‐forward Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) are capable of using a reference image to stylize a whole video sequence while removing the shower‐door effect in video style transfer applications. Compared with video style transfer, pencil drawing video is more sensitive to the inconsistency of texture and requires a stronger expression of pencil hatching. Thus, in this paper we develop an approach by combining a latest Line Integral Convolution (LIC) based method, specializing in realistically simulating pencil drawing images, with a new feed‐forward CNN that can eliminate the shower‐door effect successfully. Taking advantage of optical flow, we adopt a feature‐map‐level temporal loss function and propose a new framework to avoid the temporal inconsistency between consecutive frames, enhancing the visual impression of pencil strokes and tone. Experimental comparisons with the existing feed‐forward CNNs have demonstrated that our method can generate temporally more stable and visually more pleasant pencil drawing video results in a faster manner.

A Novel Pencil Drawing Algorithm Based on Non-Symmetry and Anti-Packing Pattern Representation Model

The artistic stylization transformation of images is an important part in the research of Non-Photorealistic Rendering (NPR). This kind of non-realistic stylized research has a very strong realistic romantic temperament and it can express the artistic pursuit of researchers very well. It is a good example of practical application combining computer science and art. In the technology of image style conversion, the simulation of the realistic art style includes mainly cartoon style, oil painting style, ink painting style and pencil drawing style. Previously, some researchers proposed a style conversion method based on the prior knowledge that there might be crosses at the junction of two lines where the tone distribution has a certain rule. However, in this paper, we have focused on the use of an edge extraction algorithm based on Non-symmetry and Anti-packing pattern representation Model (NAM) to enhance the pencil strokes and highlight the details of the image. Then, by combining the line pencil strokes with the tone drawing, we can transform the image into an image with pencil sketch style. Finally, compared with the most important previous methods, the experimental results presented in this paper showed that our proposed method showed more clearly the scene and the content and more details of the image than the previous methods. We also verified our method and calculated Structural Similarity (SSIM) and Peak Signal-to-Noise Ratio (PSNR) of original images and color pencil drawings with different algorithms on the 7 nature images and the BSDS500 data set.

Firefighter Duckies! by Frank W. Dormer

Reviewed by: Firefighter Duckies! by Frank W. Dormer Melanie Kirkwood Dormer, Frank W. Firefighter Duckies!; written and illus. by Frank W. Dormer. Atheneum, 2017 [40p] Trade ed. ISBN 978-1-4814-6090-3 $17.99 E-book ed. ISBN 978-1-4814-6091-0 $10.99 Reviewed from galleys R* 3-6 yrs "They are helpful. They are kind." Ready and willing, the Firefighter Duckies are the ones to call when you find yourself in a sticky situation. Join our quacky heroes as they valiantly extinguish a fire started by an unhappy cupcake, rescue a weary whale from an angry tree, trim the hairy exteriors of a motley crew of monsters, and so on. While the excitement and peculiarities of their adventures mean there's never a boring moment, there comes a time when even the Firefighter Duckies need some well deserved shut-eye. The repetitive structure of the story's phrasing will have listeners joining in with each iteration of "They are brave! They are strong! They are… ?" Font sizes that grow and shrink with the emotional shifts of the story provide scaffolding as early readers pick up on textual clues for performative oral storytelling, while speech-bubble dialogue of rescued creatures provides additional giggles and smiles. The use of thick black pencil strokes gives the illustrations a youthful and cartoonish feel, while the warm and mildly saturated oranges, yellows, and reds provide a silly energy and sense of urgency as the duckies move from one adventure to the next. Audiences will love the determination of the Firefighter Duckies, laugh at the unlikely emergencies, and learn that even our most beloved heroes need a break every now and then. Copyright © 2017 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Preparation of graphite conductive paint and its application to the construction of RC circuits on paper

We describe a simple procedure for the preparation of graphite-based conductive paint and determine its basic transport properties when applied, comparing them to those of pencil strokes. Ohm’s law was fulfilled on the applied paint, which makes it an ideal strategy to teach the relations between a resistor’s length, width and resistance. The conductive paint was used in the construction of RC circuits on paper in a simple and didactic format. Using only the paint and a piece of cardboard, a completely functional parallel plate capacitor can be constructed with different plate geometries; in particular, we painted circular and rectangular plates. The charge and discharge cycles of the two RC circuits painted were observed in the oscilloscope. We obtained characteristic times and estimated the value of the dielectric constant of paper, which serves as a dielectric between the plates of the capacitors. We found conductive paint to be a useful and easy method to teach basic electricity and circuit concepts in fundamental courses and lab practices because it allows one to visualise properties such as the dependence of resistance and capacitance with geometric factors using a specific material.

ColorSketch: A Drawing Assistant for Generating Color Sketches from Photos.

A color sketch creates a vivid depiction of a scene using sparse pencil strokes and casual colored brush strokes. The interactive drawing system ColorSketch can help novice users generate color sketches from photos. To preserve artistic freedom and expressiveness, the proposed system gives users full control over pencil strokes, while automatically augmenting pencil sketches using color mapping, brush stroke rendering, and blank area creation. Experimental and user study results demonstrate that users, especially novices, can create better color sketches with our system than when using traditional manual tools.

How This Book Was Made by Mac Barnett

Reviewed by: How This Book Was Made by Mac Barnett Deborah Stevenson, Editor Barnett, Mac How This Book Was Made; illus. by Adam Rex. Disney Hyperion, 2016 [48p] ISBN 978-1-4231-5220-0 $17.99 Reviewed from galleys R 5-8 yrs The story here starts with the author’s arm-wrestling of a tiger, an event that, he knows, needs to become a book, but Barnett then uses the creation of that story to [End Page 6] turn a lens on the process of literary creation itself: “The first draft of this book was not so good. Neither was the second draft. Or the third. Or the twelfth.” There’s some comic but ultimately authentic detail about working with an editor (“I took some of her advice. And I ignored some of her advice”), getting the book printed, and getting those printed books shipped. At that point things turn into a more freewheeling story about the fantastical digressive journey this particular volume undertook, ending on the reader-response note that it was really when “you read this book through to the very last page” that this book was made. While the story gets a little rambly at times, it’s friendly and vigorous, depicting writing as a communicative process rather than one of silent inspiration, and the emphasis on the necessity of imperfect work is laudable and valuable. Rex’s mixed-media art is robust and genial, with bold pencil strokes, lively collage layering, and lots of map and globe images for the communication and shipping scenes. The layout is enjoyably hectic, with text in informal font appearing aslant within bubbles and hills in contrasting digital color, adding to the humorous tumult. Kids who’d snore their way through a factual account will embrace this sustained dad joke about authorship. Copyright © 2016 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

I Can Do It Myself by Valorie Fisher (review)

Reviewed by: I Can Do It Myself by Valorie Fisher Elizabeth Bush Fisher, Valorie I Can Do It Myself; written and illus. by Valorie Fisher. Schwartz & Wade, 2014 [32p] ISBN 978-0-449-81593-9 $17.99 Reviewed from galleys Ad 2-4 yrs In this early concept picture book, Fisher takes a peripatetic tour of the mile markers of pre-school independence. Some achievements involve life skills, others are academic, and they appear in no discernible order of either type or complexity. Photographs mostly featuring plastic dolls and toys, with occasional close-ups of real children’s faces or body parts, offer generally clear visual cues to how to accomplish each task. “I know my left and I know my right” are deftly oriented to a kid’s viewpoint; viewers look down and across to a left foot and left hand on the verso, mirror imaged on the recto, while plastic animals and dolls along the top of the page raise their arms respectively. “I write my numbers” is also neatly diagrammed to demonstrate the step-by-step pencil strokes for each figure. Not all offerings are that successful, though. “I use scissors” has little to say about safety; “I use my shapes and colors” involves several shapes that were not introduced in the previous shapes section; the two-step direction on jacket zipping shows a frontal view of the zipper that the child does not see at the critical moment, and of course it fails to take into account that some skills (like shoe tying) require dexterity that arrives in its own good time. Still, the cheery palette, spacious layout, and comically pedantic retro toys should hold viewers’ attention, even as the lessons themselves are variously instructive, affirming, or simply aspirational. Copyright © 2014 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Dyaspora All Up in the Mix: Jean-Ulrick Desert, Mapping Fragmented Archaeologies

Jean-Ulrick Desert’s artwork explores diasporic black postmodernity. A Berlinbased artist who has lived in the United States, Europe, and Haiti, Desert produces evocative and enigmatic work about the black diasporic experience. Participating in a visual lexicon that decodes the inevitability of fragmentation, Desert liberates himself from the constraints of working in any one medium or style. Using diverse artistic media, including drawing, sculpture, photography, performance, and installation, he creates multidimensional spaces shaped by his formal education in architecture and his years as an exhibition designer. Personally coded narratives are intertwined with contemporary Western art practices rendered in provocative ways. Subtle strategies of pastiche anchor his earlier artworks and challenge the hackneyed nature of so-called identity politics. His recent use of self-presentation participates in the visual language of camp and sartorial play, incorporating elements that dare as well as elements that reveal truth. His satirical performance “actions,” photographs, multimedia installations, and ephemera ingeniously challenge notions of racial visibility and cultural authenticity. Desert’s “self-portrait” drawing series, L’ABCdaire de ma vie privee (The ABC’s of My Private Life) (2005), creates opportunities for the evocative exploration of race, cultural identity, belonging, and memory (see Color Plate 1). Images culled from his personal photo albums combine with simple letters and unassuming words in French, Kreyol, German, and English on fine paper lined with precisely spaced thin pencil and ink strokes that mimic the penmanship notebook pages he used as a child while living in Haiti. The plate for the letter B places us in Brooklyn, the mecca for Haitians. It is during this first part of his transnational migration that Desert realizes that he has become black and foreign; his frenchyness makes him exotic and othered. He does not feel oppressed; rather, he feels bewildered by these racial and national labels. While the images are embedded within the cultural specificity of the Haitian dyaspora, they resonate with the