Description

Harland Miller. Rags to Polyester. 2014. Edition of 50. Giclee print on German etching 310gsm paper. 37 3/8 x 29 1/2 in. (95 x 75 cm). £3600. This Giclée print by Harland Miller is based on the artist's ongoing series of fictional Penguin book-cover paintings. In these works, Miller paints the old colour-block covers which were used by the publishing house to denote genres, inscribing his own name as author of books with enjoyably deadpan, funny titles. Miller depicts the books as three-dimensional, well-worn objects, synchronising notions of identification through ownership as well as the promise of fantasy in their two-dimensional image. While detached and conceptual they make reference to the language of Abstract Expressionism and present their graphic style and literary subject with an expressive painterly style. In this work, the book's title seems tinged with a kind of disco nostalgia, an enjoyably cynical note that suggests failed personal ambition and the reality of affordable glamour.