Limited-Edition Print of 500 (13x19)
Signed and numbered by the Artist.
For me , there are two basic approaches to painting a subject, whatever that subject may be,,,a portrait, or a landscape...The fact that I am illustrating specific real cars, for my book, I frequently use the "portrait" approach to a subject...That is,,, in a portrait, the "background" only serves to enhance the subject,,, whereas in a "landscape," every portion of the painting has equal value. In fact there is no "Background" in a landscape, since all the things in the image, are the subject...
So this is my version of a landscape...Some artists like to paint "Sunsets" over water, or mountains, or some other topographic scene. I just happen to like to paint "Sunsets" over a good burnout...
Then again, some paintings just turnout better then others...of coarse it helps, if you start with great photographic references, as I was able to with this awesome Leslie Lovett captured image...I've wanted to paint this scene for a long time, but truthfully I didn't think I was good enough to do it justice...
But life is all about timing,,, or a time for all things...
I answered my ringing phone one afternoon, and was pleasantly surprised to hear the voice of Bob Gerdes from "Circus Paints" in NY...
(I talked to Bob for the first time back in 80' s when I was hanging out in Tom Stratton's paint booth... I just loved the smell of lacquer! Which probably explains a lot about me..)
Somewhere in my conversation with Bob, the subject of Barry Setzer came up, and he told me that he painted the Vegas for Barry...I had always assumed that Don Kirby painted the cars, since his name was on the back of the car... (But Kirby supplied the body, and of coarse "Lil" John did the chassis...)
That got me thinking, (or got both brain cells firing again! ) and I asked Bob about Setzer's blue car...Bob said he painted the car blue, sort of on a dare from driver Pat Foster...One evening when Bob and Pat were hoisting a few cool ones, Foster made the remark that Don Kirby couldn't paint a Candy Blue, and avoided doing that color whenever he could...So as the hops and barley took affect, candy blue became a matter of fact.
The rumor had been, that the car was painted blue, to accommodate soon to be driver Tommy Grove, who had a string of blue Fords...Certainly that sounds like the more logical story, because who would have known about the influence of Malt on the subject, except for someone who was there?
For those of you who didn't know, Bob also painted "Jungle Jim's" cars
(also seen in this painting)...
Bob's s story above, is also set to appear in the next Issue of Drag Racer magazine..
This painting is set in 1974 at Englishtown, and is a good example of the two different Vega styles. The 71 square nose Vega had become the body style of choice for a lot Funny Car teams at the time...In 74, the Vegas front nose clip was restyled by GM into a more laid back wedge shape. However, 74 body modifications didn't work that well on the strip, as the earlier square nosed shape seemed to be more stable and a little faster.
We now know, it was the square nose, that punched a hole in the air for the car to travel through. The newer wedge shaped front end, pushed down on the nose and actually slowed the cars down...Although none of this was realized at that time, and it was thought that the wedge shape slide under the air better. but as Bernstein's Tempo would show us a decade latter, that was not the case...
The trend then was to make the cars lower and lower...As the speeds increased, the front end down force started to push the body down onto the front wheels. This would heat-up the fiberglass and blister the paint, or even worse, the front tires would burn right through the body . The answer was to develop the wheel humps on the front fenders.( This was also accomplished at Bob's shop.)
In this painting ,you can see "Jungle's" new 74 car, while Setzer decided to stay with the earlier body style with the added wheel humps...
Bob wanted me to let everyone know, that he "did not" paint those horrible flames on the front of JJ's car (it is a really bad flame job!)... JJ, had a bad habit of hitting the finish line cones and tearing up the nose of the car, the flames were added so they could repair and repaint the nose while on tour.
