DRIFTING (Apologies to Charlie Harper)

Here is one I started awhile back and just got around to finishing. This one grew out of a period of low energy. The whole family was ill (those kids can bring home a lot of germs, and I seemed to catch every bug brought into the city during the Olympics), it was pissing rain day after day, I was pretty busy at work, and was just run down. The form, the mood, the palette and the title sum up my mental, emotional, and physical state at the time.

The subtitle is a reference to Cincinnati based artist Charlie Harper (1922-2007). My wife introduced me to his work last summer, and his minimalist style really appealed to my own graphic sensibilities. As a gift to her I bought her this wonderful book by Todd Oldham that collected a large selection of of Charlie Harper's work. I went through the book, cover to cover, numerous times. I hadn't looked at the book for a few months, but as I was finishing this piece I happened to be flipping through the book, and to my surprise I looked down and saw almost the very same image on the page. I didn't recall this image from the book at the time, but it must have bored it's way into my subconscious. It is humbling to realize how derivable your ideas are. Maybe one day I'll have an original idea.

I've included the Charlie Harper image (from the Giant Golden Book of Biology, 1961),with the detail. Enjoy.