All artwork in this article © Lennie Mace/THE LAB
・ lenniemace.com presents a ticker tape scroll of artwork, c.1998-2011
・ lenniemacemarket.com presents goods for sale.
A comprehensive book documenting Mace's artwork & art life in far greater detail than space permits here is slated for publication in time for Mace's 2020 Summer Olympic Ballpoint Summit group exhibition in Tokyo.
The Ballpointer will report the book's release and the exhibition.
Lennie Mace, 1984 New York, New York (May 5, 2016) Flashback PICK
''A businessman who'd seen my Mona Lisa in New York (in 1993) commissioned me to do something similar in Japan. Since the subject would be Japanese and the finished artwork would end up in Japan, I suggested they send me there to do the drawing. If I drew it in New York, it would cost them to get the artwork to Japan safely anyway,'' Mace reasoned. ''I told them they could consider the cost of the trip as partial payment and they took me up on the offer. Next thing you know, I'm in Tokyo for a month, and Kyoto, where I drew the Toji pagoda on site. I never particularly cared about Japan, and if it weren't for that commission I might never have gone, but I saw an opportunity to travel and had a good reason, so I took it. That one month was like fate. I knew I started something there and couldn't just leave it at that, so I made plans to spend more time.''
If work as an illustrator defined Mace's career in the decade prior to 1994, Japan defined it for the decade that followed, and thereafter. Appearances at high profile art expos such as NICAF in Yokohama and Tokyo's then-fledgling Design Festa during his first years there elicited art world and public interest. By 1997, Mace was holding solo exhibitions at least twice a year in Japan. Exhibitions at Isetan department store in Tokyo became part of his rounds, and provided prestige; department store exhibitions garner mass media attention and, therefore, respect for artists in Japan...
Click here to continue to the fully archived feature article
RETROSPECTACLE by E. Lee originally posted Dec. 17, 2016
Lennie Mace・Tokyo, Japan
Decade 2 : 1994-2004 Global & Mobile
By 1994, Lennie Mace had made a name for himself as an illustrator and had been exhibiting his ballpoint pen artwork in New York annually since 1990. Neither realizing it nor striving for it, he became the first artist to make news by using ballpoint pens to create halftone effects never imagined achievable, in fine figurative art which elevated the pens from their proletarian origins and association with doodling. Just as media attention and success was peaking in the US, even if only as 'that ballpoint pen guy', Mace suddenly packed up and moved to Japan, to the surprise of everyone and against the urging of advisors. More below...
RETROSPECTACLE by E. Lee, with R. Bell posted Mar. 12, 2018
Lennie Mace・Tokyo, Japan
Decade 3 : 2004-2014 Ballpoints PLUS
Japan correspondent E. Lee wraps up his online retrospective of illustrious ballpointer Lennie Mace with this long-awaited Part 3 of 3, bringing us up to date with his career between 2004 and now—decade three and into decade four for Mace as a professional artist—during which additions of new techniques, new materials, new projects and overall maturation blossomed.
By 2004, Lennie Mace had been mastering the artistic capabilities of ballpoint pens for over two decades and working with them professionally for nearly as long, producing groundbreaking 'wow'-worthy halftone effects which show little trace of the ballpoint line-work used in their creation; his so-called 'PENtings'. Mace had always been one of the few true ballpoint purists—an artist whose body of work consists mostly, if not completely, of ballpoint pen usage—but during the early years of the 21st century his creative instincts would manifest in ways that matched, and sometimes superseded, his mastery of the pen. More below...
FEBRUARY 2017
Lennie Mace Tokyo, Japan
The idea for the drawing—a Doonesbury-like line drawing of the White House festooned with Trump Taj Mahal casino neon—had been in my head since during the campaign...
Read the full archived feature
Trump White House, 2016. © Lennie Mace
JUNE 〜 JULY 2016
Lennie Mace RETROSPECTACLE New York, NY 1984-1994
'Decade 1' of a 3-part online retrospective. No other
ballpointer is more deserving than Lennie Mace, who has
produced an expansive body of work in more than 30 years...
Read the full archived feature
pictured : California Zephyr, 1994. © Lennie Mace
SEPTEMBER 2015 Lennie Mace PICKS SPECIAL New York City via Tokyo, Japan
A Far East ballpoint pen masterpiece has finally made its way West. When a long-time New York patron offered showroom space, Mace accepted...
Read the full archived feature
CosPlayStation:2011 2006-2011, ballpoint pen & cut vinyl decals on paper,
146 x 103cm (57.5 x 40.5''), shown cropped. Artwork © Lennie Mace/THE LAB
Picking up where he left off last July (Decade 1: 1984-1994),
E. Lee's online retrospective of ballpointer Lennie Mace continues, from slideshow presentations and notes compiled during a week-long visit to the artist's Ena Castle in Japan last January…
2017 FEATURE article ARCHIVE menu
*Scroll down to access more archived features from 2014-2016
DECEMBER 2016
Lennie Mace RETROSPECTACLE Tokyo, Japan 1994-2004
By 1994, Lennie Mace had made a name for himself as an illustrator and had been exhibiting his ballpoint pen artwork in New York annually since 1990. ...
Read the full archived feature
pictured : The Longer The Drool... 2005. © Lennie Mace
Since 2014
2016 FEATURE article ARCHIVE menu: Dec2015~Dec2016
CLICK HERE to access more archived FEATURE articles from the 2016 archive menu.
2017 PICKS page ARCHIVE menu
Read about these artworks in the artists' own words in The Ballpointer PICKPIECE archives.
Click on the artwork to see the archived PICKS. All artwork © respective artists.
Slideshow below : 1: Puzzled Self-Portrait (1984, 21 x 28cm) drawn on blank puzzle. 2: dreAmm (1988, 21 x 28cm) 3: Iris, Stenciled (1990, 41 x 29cm) shows Mace's original stencil graffiti icon which recurs in many early artworks. 4: Corner of Love & Hate (1990, 29 x 41cm). 5: CBS Dog (1993, 28 x 41cm) third of ' pet' series which continues to this day; drawn on nationally televised news. 6: Small Face Dog (1994, 30 x 41cm) the commission was actually to draw the rare ' Small Faces' 45rpm single.
2016 PICKS page ARCHIVE menu: Dec2015~Dec2016
CLICK HERE to access more PICKed artwork and artist explanations from 2016.
... An online retrospective would instead become our story. No other ballpointer is more deserving than Lennie Mace, who has produced an expansive body of work in more than 30 years as a professional artist. The artwork presented here is surely new to many, but these were among the artworks which put Mace on the map. Drawn between 1984 and 1994, before the internet and social media, these were the viral works of their time, written about in newspapers and magazines and discussed on TV in New York City and around the USA. These are not Mace's earliest ballpoint penworks — The Ballpointer featured one earlier example, drawn in 1982, as a PICK in May — and they are not his only ballpoint artworks from that period, but they represent a finely documented birth and evolution of one artist's foray into uncharted art territory. With that 1982 drawing as a starting point, it became interesting to gauge Mace's progress in ballpoint pen during his first prolific decade. These were drawn as the artist grew into a popular illustrator (another story) and colorful character in 1980s New York (another movie), and for his earliest solo exhibitions at the start of the 1990s. At that time, there were neither ballpoint predecessors nor peers; no footsteps for Mace to follow...
Read the fully archived article, the first of a 3-part series ・
MARCH 2015 Lennie Mace Tokyo, Japan
This must be the wrong exhibition. Lennie Mace is, after all, known for colorfully detailed, elaborately composed ballpoint artwork, but no such artwork is on display here; only blank sheets of paper, beautifully framed... Read the full archived feature.
Goat Gal (Goat 1 of 4) 2014, ballpoint pen & ''dry'' ballpoint pen on paper, shown cropped. An example of ''colorfully detailed'' Mace,
showing usage of ''dry pen'' patterns. Artwork © Lennie Mace/THE LAB
Lennie Mace Tokyo, Japan (March 3, 2015)
Slideshow above : All artwork Media Graffiti series and 365DAZE project; ballpoint pen on printed matter. All artwork © Lennie Mace.
Next installment, Winter 2017 : Decade 3: 2004-2014
For more art and information :
RECAP originally posted November 2, 2015
A Year in The Pen
The Ballpointer Nov 2014 ~ Nov 2015
Someday, someone else will list the accomplishments of The Ballpointer annually, but, seeing as all involved had doubts as to whether the site would even make it through a year, much less become the crown jewel of our fledgling empire, please bear with us as we bask in our own glory. OK, year-end timeline lists of accomplishments are usually lame. As publishers, we promise to never do this again. That said, allow us to remind you why we're here, lest you forget. A True Story…
October, 2012: An alcohol fueled discussion during an after-party following the opening reception of an exhibition featuring ballpoint pen artwork turns to questions of why, especially by 2012, mass media continue to report about ballpoint pen art as if it was a brand new concept. Part of that discussion went something like this…
Drinker No.1: ''Any source referring to ballpoint pen art as something new only shows how ignorant they are and how little they researched their subject'' ...
RETROSPECTACLE by E. Lee
originally posted June 12, 2016
Lennie Mace・New York, New York
Decade 1 : 1984-1994 Birth of Visual Vocabulary
If only every assignment proved so fruitful. Show up to report one story; come away with five or more stories. At the invitation of artist Lennie Mace, staff of The Ballpointer converged in the mountains of central Japan to report about what could be called 'the castle that ballpoints built ' — the castle that ballpoints are buildING, that is. While it is already quite a sight to behold, Mace's Ena Castle (Ena being the name of the town) is still too much of a work-in-progress and was deemed not-yet-ready for the exposure it will one day deserve. Luckily Mace is full of other stories. At the time of our visit, the artist happened to be in the midst of scanning slides and transparencies into digital data for publication in an upcoming book about him and his artwork. By our insistent pleading, informal slideshows accompanied by drinks became a nightly event. Mace not only provided candid narration but also gave his permission for The Ballpointer to share a sampling of his archive with readers. More below...
2015 FEATURE article ARCHIVE menu: Nov2014~Nov2015
CLICK HERE to access more archived FEATURE articles from the 2015 archive menu.
2015 PICKS page ARCHIVE menu: Feb~Nov2015
CLICK HERE to access more PICKed artwork and artist explanations from 2015.
In the wake of publicity stirred up by the 2002 opening of his Tokyo Viewseum came a wave of interest attracting new patrons with grander commissions. Mace hadn't solicited attention to the Viewseum himself but, being work commissioned as a salon interior, the patron did. Soon enough, word simply got around about the salon-with-a-view. Mace elaborated upon design details from the Viewseum to fill requests for commissions, and there happened to be plenty of design details and commissions—whole brass sections-worth of trumpets, flugelhorns, cornets and tubas hand-crafted into light fixtures, even a chandelier; Walls completely resurfaced with CD and vinyl picture-discs, affixed using artful arrangements of washers and other stainless steel hardware; walls, doors and ceilings wallpapered in a collaging of magazine pages, fabrics, stickers and, again, hardware.
Finding new things to do and new ways to do them using new tools and materials further fueled Mace's already-voracious appetite to create. Output exploded in every direction, leading him into a prolific period which continues to bear fruit. A one-man renaissance had been set into motion, but unless you were in direct contact with Mace or his circle of supporters you might never have known about much of it. It was all a publicists dream, but by that time Mace was already quietly enjoying a career of his own and feeling less-inclined to, in his own words, ''pander'' ...
Click here to continue to the fully archived feature article