In Shadows I Boogie (blue)
Signed Print

In Shadows I Boogie is an example of Harland Miller’s clever and humorous geometric monographs inspired by his series of recreating various types of book covers. Starting with his most famous Penguin Series based on the dust jackets of vintage Penguin books, Miller continues to blend his lifelong fascination with literature, various artistic influences like Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art, and his quintessential, sarcastic sense of humour. Playing with notions of authenticity and intrigued by language, Miller is influenced by the Pop movement and artists like Ed Ruscha in using well-known formats such as book cover designs as a visual context for his subversive titles and producing new meaning through various colour-coded combinations of text and image. In Shadows I Boogie is part of a later series that grew out of the Penguin prints, which was inspired by the covers of pop psychology books of the 60s and 70s and featured ironic titles that dealt with themes of mental illness and psychological disorders, such the work Happiness – The Case Against. In contrast to the usually unicoloured backgrounds of the Penguin series, these works feature brighter and more vibrant compositions characterized by geometric abstraction.