actually, you could also display the text with the labels. turning off the autosize property and then manage the size of the labels (same size with the column) will clip the content.

on the otherhand, if you going to use some raw graphics you would need a canvass to draw from which should be your main container control. it could be a picturebox control. and on paint event you could get reference to its graphics object, and then perform your string drawings there. however, why wouldn't use the gridview or datagrid? you could inherit some of their built-in features.