Scott Tulay Deconstructs Architectural Drawings

A haunting sensation pervades much of Scott Tulay’s illustrations. An architecture by trade, he creates abstract architectural drawings that investigate the ambiguity of space.

“As an architect, I meticulously create drawings to reveal and describe a building’s design and construction,” writes Tulay on his website. “In my art studio, I am able to break from all these conventions and push the gravitational and spatial boundaries of these spaces I imagine.”

“My daughters, who are eight and five, consistently complain that my drawings are ‘too scary,’” he joked in an interview with Mass Cultural Council. “They will ask me ‘Why can’t you draw something nice, with color, like with a rainbow?’ Once in a while, however, I’ll do a drawing, and they’ll tilt their heads to the side and say ‘Not bad, Dad.’ This scares me.”

Indeed, you might feel a bit uneasy looking at his drawings. A feeling of disorientation might just creep in. Whether inspired by built form or natural context, his art is constructed by an armature of light. Light, or fog, is engaged in either defining space or dematerializing the landscape or architectural elements depicted. In some drawings, the viewer appears to be floating and is looking both up and down at the same time.

Look closely: