Ladybugs will save the world!

Yesterday, as I was waiting in Province for my short rib and kimchi sandwich, I flipped through the most recent issue of Dwell, and landed on a sidebar in memoriam item in the letters section on Charley Harper, a Cincinnati-based artist who passed away in June. I stopped on the page and stared for a while at the picture, a striking print of a crane in repose on an orange background.

The bird man, Charley Harper.

His name had come to my attention a few times recently, once back in January when Dooce linked to these Harper-esque screenprints from Pushmepullyou Designs, and more recently, when I noticed a book of his prints at the AMMO table during BEA. "I know this guy's stuff," I said at the time. There was something familiar about it; the cardinals struck me in particular. But I couldn't tell you how I knew him to save my life.

So today I called my mom. As you do when you need a jab in the memory.

"Mom, have you ever heard of Charley Harper?"

"Sure. He just passed away this June."

"Do you see a lot of his work around southern Ohio?"

She thought for a while about the people she knows who own a Harper print, friends and colleagues. Even she has a ladybug print* at home.

"And then he did that mural in the science building..."

"Don't we have a picture of John standing in front of it with the artist?"

"Yes, that one."

"So we have a picture of John with Charley Harper? Wow."

"Uh-huh."

"I feel like I remember the cardinals."

"Well, grandma has a sweatshirt with one of his cardinal prints on it."

"That's why..."

And so he was there all my life, like something I've just noticed in the background of an old photograph. Prints hanging on office walls come into focus. My brother, shifty and impatient as a boy, still for a moment, posing in front of a mural with a friendly-looking gentleman. My grandmother and her lovely cardinal sweatshirts.

It's funny how the little things you notice can be a bigger part of you than you ever realized.

*Mom, if it's this one, then I look forward to my next birthday. (Cake is nice, but I'm holding out for a Harper.)

UPDATE (February 3, 2008) For those of you who ended up here looking for Charley Harper prints after the CBS Sunday Morning report, please visit Treadway Gallery or Fabulous Frames & Art.

© Zan McQuade. All rights reserved.