We’ve all experimented with the Etch A Sketch at some stage in our empty lives. As one of the most popular toys of the baby boomer generation, it’s something that we’ve all stumbled across in some backstairs bedroom or at some filthy children’s birthday party. Maybe somebody gave you one for Christmas when you were a kid, or you begged your parents to buy you one at the supermarket checkout. Whatever your Etch A Sketch memories are formed upon, though, it was never something that we ever expected to gain mastery of. It was just something that was there and ostensibly always has been. Like a mountain, or the ocean or convenience stores…
Fast forward to 2008 then, the year of the rat, economic gloom and uncertainty, and you can’t help but wonder if all that came before was actually worth it. Whilst the rest of us have been attempting to buy into the system, convince ourselves that it works and everything is a.o.k, one man, known only as the Etchasketchist on his Flickr page, has been pushing the boundaries of dexterity and dedication to challenge the staid conventions of the art world with his Etch A Sketch delineations of the transient imagery of our times. Nothing can summarise this point more clearly than the rendition of short-lived Heath Ledger as the Joker…
