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This is a 24″x24″ acrylic on canvas piece.

I few years ago I created album artwork for Vintage Harmonic Symphony’s album, Lady Brambleberry.  In fall of 2025, Bobby commissioned me to do another album cover for their album The Farmer and the Mule.  The title is from an old fable involving a farmer whose mule falls down an old unused well on his property.  The mule is old and he figures it’s easier just to bury the mule while it’s in the well, so he begins shoveling dirt on top of the mule.  Instead of succumbing to his fate, the mule shakes off each shovel full and eventually has enough dirt to climb out.  In the case of the album, the idea is that music is what helps us turn what is meant to destroy us into the means of escape.

Bobby had two concepts he was toying with.  One was a farmer and a mule (or donkey) in the style of Grant Wood’s American Gothic. The other was a well with musical instruments draped over the side in the style of Salvador Dali’s The Persistence of Memory.  Ultimately Bobby went with the latter as his album art, which I entitled The Persistence of Music, but I liked the American Gothic idea so much that I painted that one as well, I have to say, I’m glad I did.  The cheekiness of the donkey braying next to the dour farmer tickles me.

Project Images

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