The Charcoal Dreamers - 2019-2021

The Charcoal Dreamers ventures into the depths of primordial imagination, crafting scenes that echo the spirit of ancient cave art and the flickering nature of dreams. Created in solitude, these drawings are quiet, deliberate, and haunting - as though drawn from within a deeper, older part of the mind.

Rendered in dense black ink on paper, each image conjures a world where figures drift in and out of view: human forms with flowing hair raise their arms in ritual or offering; animals - including still, monumental horses - stand as if remembered rather than observed. The compositions are spare, yet charged with symbolic potential.

Recurring motifs recall the earliest gestures of image-making - hands, silhouettes, beasts - not quoted but reimagined, as if passed down through memory rather than art history. There is no narrative, but the drawings feel full of recognition, like dreams we’ve forgotten and only now recall in fragments.

The monochrome palette heightens the sense of timelessness and interiority. Light doesn’t fall here; it emerges. Darkness isn’t the background - it’s the medium. These images don’t simply depict; they release - one mark at a time.

The Charcoal Dreamers invites the viewer into a space both intimate and universal - a place of solitude, yes, but also of shared instinct. These are not illustrations. They are meditations on presence, memory, and the quiet urgency to make a mark - even, or especially, when no one is watching.

Charcoal Dreamers 111 Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021
Mark Alexander's ink artwork: Young boy standing contemplatively in a textured cave.

Charcoal Dreamers Elephant Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian Ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021

Charcoal Dreams VIII Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and indian ink on paper
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021
Mark Alexander's pen and ink art: Deer sips from cave pool, faint outline of 'Creation of Adam' above.

Charcoal Dreamers I Backdrop drawing

  • Indian ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2020-1
Pen and ink drawing by Mark Alexander; ethereal figure with curly hair spreads arms amidst textured background.

Charcoal Dreams iX Backdrop drawing

  • Indian ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021
Mark Alexander pen and ink: Deer by water in cave, intricate grid shading with faint overhead figures.

Charcoal Dreamers XV Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian Ink on Paper
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021
Mark Alexander's ink sketch: Two giraffes amid patterned background with repeating handprints.

Charcoal Dreamers 1V Backdrop drawing

  • Indian Ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2020
Mark Alexander's ink drawing: Horse nestled within textured cave, intricate shading and detail.

Charcoal Dreams VII Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian ink on paper
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021
Mark Alexander's pen and ink art: supine figure in a cave with wavy patterns and a sketched old radio above.

Charcoal Dreamers II

  • Indian ink
  • 50 x 70 cm
  • 2021
Pen and ink art by Mark Alexander; abstract horses on a textured grid backdrop with subtle shading.

Charcoal Dreamers V1111 Backdrop drawing

  • Indian ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2020
Mark Alexander's artwork: Elderly knight in shadows of a cave, narrowly missed by a beam of light.

Charcoal Dreams Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2020

Charcoal Dreams X

  • Indian ink
  • 50 x 70 cm
  • 2021
Mark Alexander's pen and ink drawing: Buff figure pushes against cave wall, sunlight beams to his left.

Charcoal Dreamer X11. Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian Ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021

Charcoal Dreamers X Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian Ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021

Charcoal Dreamers V1 Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021

Charcoal Dreamers IX. Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian Indian Ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021

Charcoal Dreams 111. Backdrop drawing

  • Indian Ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2021

Charcoal Dreams XII Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian ink on paper
  • 63 x 36 cm
  • 2021
Mark Alexander's pen and ink depiction: Unearthly, shadowy figure sketches on a cave wall.

The Charcoal Dreamers VV

  • Indian ink
  • 50 x 70 cm
  • 2023
Pen and ink by Mark Alexander: Elephant with flower in trunk leans over cave edge, reaching for sketched mouse.

Charcoal Dreamers lV Backdrop drawing

  • Pen and Indian ink
  • 70 x 50 cm
  • 2020