Drawing Restraint has been Barney’s continuous project since 1987. The works were inspired by the idea that resistance makes muscles larger and stronger due to hypertrophy.In performing these pieces, Barney utilizes tethers, ramps, weights, pulleys, skates, even a trampoline, anything that would affect and restrict his capacity to draw.

Published on the occasion of the exhibition Matthew Barney: Drawing Restraint at Kanazawa, Japan (July – August 2005), Seoul, Korea (Oct 2005 – January 2006) and San Francisco, USA (June – September 2006). This publication includes an interview with Matthew Barney by Hans Ulrich Obrist, which addresses the relationship between this project and the artist’s Cremaster series of films.