Marker sketches · drawn from life

Olek Buzunov

{NO ERASERS / NO UNDO}

Drawn entirely by hand from direct observation. No AI.

425 sheets in marker 101 nights 2017–2026 Jersey City, NJ

This is not a performance. A face arrives on paper in minutes, in front of whoever is there, with nothing taken back.

The clock is a boundary, not a race.

What remains on the sheet is the record of the encounter⁠—not its purpose.

02 The rule

1

The clock

A pose lasts between 30 sec and 20 min. When the model moves, the sheet is finished: there is no going back to it.

2

The marker

Marker does not come off. A line that was wrong is still on the sheet, with the better one beside it. No eraser, no undo.

3

The room

Every sheet is drawn from a person who is there: a model on a stand, with other people drawing and whoever stops to watch. Not from a photograph, and not by a machine.

03 The nights

All 147 nights →

Every public drawing session since 2017: meetups, studio nights and the rooms that hosted them. The performance record of the practice, one year at a time.

208 sessions 2017–2026

  1. 2017 39 Drawing AmericaSalmagundi Club, ManhattanJersey City Art SchoolElevator (JC Print Room), Jersey CityMy studio 48 with drawings →
  2. 2018 26 Drawing AmericaCentral Park, New YorkMy studioElevator (JC Print Room), Jersey City 24 with drawings →
  3. 2019 54 Drawing AmericaElevator (JC Print Room), Jersey CityMana Contemporary, Jersey CityJersey City Art SchoolMy studio 13 with drawings →
  4. 2020 6 My studioMana Contemporary, Jersey City 16 with drawings →
  5. 2021 25 My studioDrawing with Russians (Art D Block), ManhattanJersey City Art SchoolOld Stone House Drawing Studio, BrooklynDrawing America 24 with drawings →
  6. 2022 21 My studioJersey City Art School 14 with drawings →
  7. 2023 7 My studioDrawing with Russians (Art D Block), Manhattan 2 with drawings →
  8. 2024 13 Drawing AmericaElevator (JC Print Room), Jersey CityDrawing with Russians (Art D Block), Manhattan 4 with drawings →
  9. 2025 9 My studioDrawing with Russians (Art D Block), Manhattan 1 with drawings →
  10. 2026 8 Drawing AmericaMy studio 1 with drawings →

The 101 nights drawn in marker, newest first.

04 A year in residence

Proposal · twelve months

One year, one medium, one subject: the people of a shared building, drawn from life in marker.

Twelve months in a live/work community, spent on one thing: marker drawings from life of the people who live and work there, and of the ones who come through. Residents at work, rehearsals, recording sessions, fittings, openings, open studios. One pose, one sheet, a few minutes each, dated and kept in the order drawn.

The practice is urban and social already. I live in Jersey City and have drawn in its rooms since 2017: Jersey City Art School, Elevator, Mana Contemporary, and in 208 public sessions in all. It happens where people already are, and it has always drawn a crowd without asking for one.

What I am after is what a drawing session cannot give me: people at work rather than posing, a dancer or a musician as the subject, and a wall large enough to see a year of sheets at once.

What the year makes

  • Several hundred sheets, each with its date, its length and its place in its night.
  • A portrait of the building: every resident who agrees to sit, drawn in minutes in their own studio.
  • The record in the open: each night published here sheet by sheet, the way the nights are now.
  • A wall at the end of the year: the sheets hung together, in the order they were drawn.

What I bring to a shared building

  • Drawing where the work happens: at a rehearsal, in the recording studio, at a fitting, without stopping it.
  • A drawing table at open studios, openings and the fair: whoever sits down is drawn in five minutes, in front of whoever is watching.
  • A model night open to the residents and neighbours who draw: a model, a clock and room to work.
  • Other disciplines as the subject: a dancer gives movement, a musician rhythm, a designer a silhouette.

What it needs

  • A table, a wall and people.
  • Paper and markers. No open flame, no fumes, no dust.

Read the proposal → Write to me →

05 A sheet of your own

All 425 marker sketches →
20 min, marker on paper, shown in a black frame with a white mat, hanging on a bedroom wall above a bedside table, beside the bed (staged view, composed digitally; room: Photo by Lisa Anna on Pexels)

Every sheet is the original drawing, as it left the pad.

$60
a sheet, unframed
$110
framed behind glass, in the frame you choose
−30%
a whole night of 10 sheets or more taken as one set; less for a shorter night

Choose a night → See it framed → Inquire →

06 About

Draws in public: parks, platforms, rehearsals, openings. Not a show, but the process has always drawn a crowd. Timed drawing from life, in marker. Jersey City.

Artistic credentials

Awards

  • Honorable Mention, Portrait Drawing

    The Drawing Foundation, Drawing Competition 2026

    May 2, 2026 · for Portrait in Profile

About Olek → Inquire →

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