Books by Cecil Touchon

The idea behind asemic writing is to create artworks that are based on the act of mark making similar to handwriting but without reference to semantic content or literary meaning. I suppose you could call it a form of literary abstraction or perhaps non-objective literature. Hence each 'asemic writer' has a unique way of writing or making marks. When we look at handwriting, even if we are unable to decipher it, we are getting some sort of visual content out of it from looking at the marks and rhythms or distributions of the markings on the page. We can get a feeling of order or discipline or perhaps a frenetic energy, or playful or sloppy or it might seem confused or muddled. You might say this is the body language of the handwriting beyond the message conveyed. This body language is the part that is of interest in this work and to asemic writers in general.

This work is intended to be purely visual with no reference to literary content or convey any sort of symbols. There is an interest however in musicality, of moving the focal point of the eye along during the reading through repetition, cadence, movement, etc. It is a form of listening with the eye as the title of the book suggests. The idea behind asemic writing is to create artworks that are based on the act of mark making similar to handwriting but without reference to semantic content or literary meaning. Hence each 'writer' has a unique way of writing or making marks. When we look at handwriting, even if we are unable to decipher it, we are getting some sort of visual content out of it from looking at the marks and rhythms or distributions of the markings on the page. You might say this is the body language of the writing beyond the message conveyed. This body language is the part that is of interest in this work.

These works might be called automatic writing or visual writing or asemic writing. There is no intention to tell a story or to use any recognizable language or symbols. Rather the works function freely with intuition rather than thought, allowing the hand to just do what the hand does; make marks. There is a kind of visual vocabulary however, such as letter-like marks, punctuation-like marks such as chevrons, commas, accents, dashes and dots, the organization for the most part is in lines of markings to suggest a reading of progression. Some are lyrical and look almost like what a visual music score might look like. I experimented with different rhythmic motions, different ways of holding the tool, sometimes in silence and at other times while listening to music. Sometimes I would watch closely as the work unfolded and at other times allowing my hand to move along the page unobserved in order to see what would happen.

This is volume three in a set of asemic notebooks. Like volume one, these poems or texts or drawings depending on how you think about them were all made with an ink marker on 6x4 inch smooth, glossy photographic paper. My idea was to have the works function as if they were plates of texts in a book so that the image would appear without a visible background. In this way the writing or text uses the page itself as background in the typical way that print functions in a book.These works might be called automatic writing or visual writing or asemic writing. There is no intention to tell a story or to use any recognizable language or symbols. Rather the works function in free flow with intuition rather than thought, allowing the hand to just do what the hand does; make marks. I prefer a more improvisational approach as if I am playing an instrument that records in marks what might otherwise be heard as notes of music.This is the natural realm of the arts; to work in a state of mindfulness or meditation.

The writings presented here were composed specifically for existing in a book environment as unified text. These works might be called automatic writing or visual writing or asemic writing. There is no intention to tell a story or to use any recognizable language or symbols. Rather the works function in free flow with intuition rather than thought, allowing the hand to just do what the hand does; make marks. Touchon uses improvisational approach to mark making as if playing an instrument that records in marks what might otherwise be heard as notes of music and this might be a way to approach the work - to look as if listening; spending time studying the nature of the work; its flow, its progression, its repetitions, etc. just as we might have an aesthetic experience from looking at pages of text in a foreign language that we are not conversant in. In such a case we get to enjoy the work on a purely visual level without the conversion of the characters into linguistic meanings.

Catalogue Raisonne for the year 2017. This work contains all works create over the course of a year in chronological order.

Exhibition catalog for the Dada Centennial show with an international survey of contemporary collage and assemblage art with over 300 works shown.

This is a catalog of works by Cecil Touchon created in the year 2015.This publication is something of a catalogue raisonne for the year. Very few photographic works are included other than images that document my artistic activity. Publishable photos may be found in a separate catalog. Otherwise, this book has almost every hand-made art work created during the year of 2015 including paintings, collages, drawings, sketches, and correspondence works. There may be a doodle here and there or a few unfinished works that have not be included, but this document accurately records the chronological order of at least 98% of the artwork for the year.

This is a catalog of works by Cecil Touchon created in the year 2016. This publication is something of a catalogue raisonne for the year. Very few photographic works are included other than images that document my artistic activity. Publishable photos may be found in a separate catalog. Otherwise, this book has almost every hand-made art work created during the year of 2014 including paintings, collages, drawings, sketches, and correspondence works. There may be a doodle here and there or a few unfinished works that have not be included, but this document accurately records the chronological order of at least 98%%%% of the artwork for the year. Also included is documentation of exhibitions that Touchon was in or curated as well as collage poetry that was created over the course of the year. This document is intend to be a raw recording of work without any editing and represents a diary-like document of the artistic thought process.

All art works created by Cecil Touchon during the year of 2013. Includes installation photos of exhibitions, poetry, photographs, articles, etc. about Cecil Touchon.