Well, this one's kind of a weird one, but here's the story. While I was at art school, I was given the following assignment: take some kind of artwork/logo/image and put it in a new context so it has a new meaning. To make a long story short, I found this image (think it was a medieval woodcut) of the meeting of Mary & Elizabeth. (From the Bible. You know, when they told each other the good news that Jesus & John the Baptist were on the way.) So these happy cousins embraced (I think they were cousins, am I right?). I put those dark archways over them (reminds me of Richard Thompson's "At the dark end of the street" - song about some illicit lovers) and hoped it would now look like a picture of two medieval lady lovers hiding in the shadows.
I can't remember how the assignment turned out (although I do remember doing the artwork while working on the midnight shift at the Trinity College Library - which is exactly why I liked working those mostly-dead shifts), but what happened later was that I made a bunch of copies of the image on different coloured papers and used them for this year's Christmas card. The other reason I made copies of the image was to use it for a gift for my mom. At that time, we were both trying to wean ourselves off coffee (good luck... 14 years later!!!!!). So I thought of concocting a half-&-half coffee mix using regular coffee and decaffeinated beans. I put these mixtures into bags and labelled them with these pictures, dubbing it the "Mary & Elizabeth blend" (my mom & I each have another name... hers is Mary & mine is Elizabeth). It wasn't long before the bags were empty we were both back to the buzz of the real stuff.
I can't remember how the assignment turned out (although I do remember doing the artwork while working on the midnight shift at the Trinity College Library - which is exactly why I liked working those mostly-dead shifts), but what happened later was that I made a bunch of copies of the image on different coloured papers and used them for this year's Christmas card. The other reason I made copies of the image was to use it for a gift for my mom. At that time, we were both trying to wean ourselves off coffee (good luck... 14 years later!!!!!). So I thought of concocting a half-&-half coffee mix using regular coffee and decaffeinated beans. I put these mixtures into bags and labelled them with these pictures, dubbing it the "Mary & Elizabeth blend" (my mom & I each have another name... hers is Mary & mine is Elizabeth). It wasn't long before the bags were empty we were both back to the buzz of the real stuff.
Follow along to see the 2000 Christmas card - one of my favourites!
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