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The Drawn Blank Series

Bob Dylan's 'The Drawn Blank Series' prints are giclées published by Washington Green Fine Art between 2008 and 2021, mostly in editions of 295. Each reproduces one of Dylan's watercolour and gouache reworkings of the tour drawings in his 1994 book 'Drawn Blank', and the releases include standard, medium and large formats, boxed sets and four-print portfolios of a single image in different colours.

All The Drawn Blank Series Works By Bob Dylan (102)

Significance & Analysis

'The Drawn Blank Series' is where Bob Dylan's public life as a visual artist began. It gave him his first museum and gallery exhibitions, and its prints were the first editions ever made from his artworks.

How the images were made

The drawings date from Dylan's tours of America, Europe and Asia between 1989 and 1992. When Ingrid Mössinger, director of the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz in Germany, proposed an exhibition of the drawings, Dylan said it gave him "the impetus to realize the vision I had for these drawings many years ago". The original sheets had gone missing, so he worked over scans of them, transferred onto deckle-edged paper and painted in watercolour and gouache. Working this way, he painted many images more than once, each time in a different palette. "Every picture spoke a different language to me as the various colours were applied," he wrote. The exhibition opened in Chemnitz on 28 October 2007 with more than 200 of the paintings.

The editions

The prints followed in 2008, launched with the series' first gallery exhibition at Halcyon Gallery in London that June. They are giclées, printed by GTZ Fine Art Editions in New York on Hahnemühle Museum Etching paper. The colour variations carried straight into the editions: the first release included portfolios of 'Man On A Bridge' and 'Woman In Red Lion Pub', each showing one drawing in four palettes, and 2010 added a four-colour 'Cassandra' portfolio.

New instalments followed most years until 2016. The 2011 set of eight marked Dylan's 70th birthday with previously unpublished images, and the six prints of 2016 returned to favourite subjects such as 'Sidewalk Café' and 'Fisherman' in new colourways. The 2018 tenth-anniversary release is a series in its own right, 'The Drawn Blank Series 2018 (10th Anniversary)'. In 2021 came 'Backyard' and 'Truck', a set of two in an edition of 95 with floated edges, timed to Dylan's 'Retrospectrum' exhibition at the Frost Art Museum in Miami.

'Train Tracks', first painted for this series in 2007, became an image Dylan has returned to in many editions since. Where 'The Drawn Blank Series' reworked sketches from the early 1990s, 'The Beaten Path', first shown in 2016, turned to a portrait of the American landscape, found in overlooked roadside places.

What Are the Edition Sizes of The Drawn Blank Series Prints?

Standard-format prints, on a 70 x 56 cm sheet, are editions of 295, as are the medium-format prints on a 91.5 x 71 cm sheet. Large-format prints, such as 'Two Sisters' (2008) and 'Man On A Bridge' (2010), are editions of 195. In the portfolios and boxed sets, every print carries the same edition number. The 2021 set of 'Backyard' and 'Truck' is an edition of 95. Artist's proofs and printer's proofs exist alongside the numbered editions.

Why Do Some Drawn Blank Titles Appear in Several Different Years?

Because each release editioned a different version of the image, often in a new colourway. A 2009 'Bicycle' and a 2010 'Bicycle' are separate editions, each with its own run of numbers. 'Sunday Afternoon', for example, was released in 2008, 2010, 2012, 2014 and 2016. When buying, check the year as well as the title, on both the print's documentation and the listing.

Are The Drawn Blank Series Prints Hand-Signed?

Yes. Every release in the series was hand-signed by Dylan and numbered in pencil. When Dylan acknowledged in 2022 that some prints had been signed by autopen, the editions affected were two collections released that year, neither of them part of 'The Drawn Blank Series'.

What Should Come With a Drawn Blank Series Print?

A certificate of authenticity from Washington Green Fine Art, the publisher, for each print, including each print in a set. Check that the certificate matches the print's title, year and edition number. Portfolios came in grey folios, and boxed sets with each print in its own presentation wallet inside a grey box, so original packaging is a useful sign that a set is complete.