Up against the 3-D showmanship of sculpture and the celebrity status of painting, drawing can seem like the ugly stepsister of the art world. Still, it's the way much art is born. Arcadia University Art Gallery's "Works on Paper" biennial is in its 24th year, and continues to grow in popularity and scope. Arcadia hit the jackpot when MoMA drawings curator Cornelia Butler agreed to serve as the show's juror. Butler sifted through nearly 900 entries, eventually paring down the group to 48 works by 40 artists (she'll give a talk at the gallery April 18).

Gallery director Richard Torchia is excited about the range of techniques and approaches to the medium. "There's a superficial diversity but you might notice similarities in the devotion to detail and handwork," says Torchia. "Effective effort as opposed to mindless effort." Case in point, he says, is the stitched, quilt-like work of longtime Philadelphia artist Astrid Bowlby. "She's harnessed this kind of mark-making that could in other hands go another way," he says. "It's not about the time spent, but about the state of mind when making it."

Right now, says Torchia, contemporary art is fresh and interdisciplinary. "Everybody is sort of cross-dressing across disciplines," he says. Boundaries are stretched with James Johnson's peep show in a Dell computer box and Sarah Daub's cut-paper meditation. Still others, like Randall Sellers and Michelle Oosterbaan, work within more traditional confines of the medium. Jessica Doyle dwells somewhere in between; her Untitled (pictured) is an intergenerational gathering executed in pencil, ink and acrylic. Also look for the creepy composites of Nils Orth, who pieced together close-up digital images of several people for Chuck-Close-like head-on "portraits." New work by M. Ho., Linda Yun and Stefan Abrams sits comfortably alongside veterans like Anda Dubinskis and Judith Schaechter.

Drawing will always be popular in the marketplace, says Torchia, not only because artists enjoy making it, but also because it's affordable to make and buy. "It remains the most direct and immediate art form," he says. "It's great to see drawing rule."

"Works on Paper" Biennial Exhibition, Cornelia Butler lecture, Tue., April 18, 6:30 p.m., exhibit runs through April 25, Arcadia University Art Gallery, 450 S. Easton Rd., Glenside, Pa., 215-572-2133.