BLUE MOONS | YELLOW COWS | GREEN TAMBOURINES was originally created for a Book Arts class at the Corcoran College of Art and Design. I'd long wanted to create a book illustrating rock lyrics, ever since the day I heard Jack Bruce sing "Silver horses ran down moonbeams in her dark eyes." That song -- Cream's "White Room" -- like many songs of the era, struck a strong visual chord with me. I seemed to see the song as much as hear it.
Although the desire to illustrate songs had always had rather vague outlines, for Blue Moons I wanted to create categories to reflect the book's unique binding. In its original form, Blue Moons was a piano hinge book--a book structure whose signatures are interlaced and held together by rods or skewers in an exposed binding. Because the binding's emphasis on signatures creates natural breaks in structure, I decided to exploit that characteristic and give the book natural breaks in theme. "Colors" seemed like a good choice.
With only a couple of weeks to complete the assignment--from concept through finished book--the challenge was as much an exercise in intuitive, spontaneous illustration as in how to assemble the book. Although I'd taken up Book Arts partially as a break from my career as an illustrator, I now found myself assigning me thirty-plus illustrations, to be completed in one week. Had the client been anyone but me, I'd have probably turned down the job. But I accepted the challenge: spontaneity, improvisation, and intuitive thinking and drawing.
After compiling a list of songs and editing them down to those with the most vivid imagery--and I chose only songs or artists I like, which admittedly eliminated some pretty good visuals -- I set about creating the illustrations. Thirty, plus the cover (an homage to the Woodstock poster, for those too young--or old--to remember), appear in this book; others were completed and left on the cutting room floor. For each illustration, I deliberately went with my gut, developing the first idea that came to mind. I worked quickly with little or no digital "cleaning up," and moved on to the next one, resisting the urge to go back and edit or over produce. In terms of illustration, these are almost the equivalent of gesture drawings. The illustrations were completed over a five day period. Many of them were started with only a vague idea of where they might end up, an approach I often use in sketching: just start drawing and see what comes out. The result is an immediacy, rawness and honesty in the artwork, qualities that are too often polished into oblivion by the demands and expectations of my commissioned illustration work.
Blue Moons is a labor of love, and as much as anything is a tribute to the songwriters whose words and creative spirit are excerpted within.
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