In the early 1960s, just as his rise to prominence as a musician gathered pace, Dylan started to draw. In Chronicles, his memoir of 2004, he suggested it was a way of keeping control of a rapidly shifting life. “I sat at the table, took out a pencil and paper and drew the typewriter, a crucifix, a rose, pencils, knives and pins, empty cigarette boxes. I’d lose track of time completely. . . Not that I thought I was any great drawer, but I did feel like I was putting an orderliness to the chaos around.”
Drawing, painting and sculpting have remained his way of maintaining order ever since. It is a simple enough reason to make visual art. Songs are temporal, with a beginning, an end, a duration and sometimes a narrative, but a painting can be free of these traits. As Dylan has said, “the purpose of art is to stop time”. But since many of his pictures start as sketches made while on his endless tours, perhaps their unspoken purpose is to pass time.
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