JULIAN OPIE, IMAGINE YOU ARE DRIVING (FAST)/OLIVIER/HELMET, IMAGINE YOU ARE DRIVING (FAST) SERIES, SIGNED DIGITAL PRINT, EDITION OF 50, 2002
Imagine You Are Driving (Fast)/Olivier is a print from Julian Opie’s Imagine You Are Driving (Fast) series from 2002 that shows a portrait of the famous Formula 1 driver Olivier Panis. Alongside the portrait is a dramatically flat image of a racetrack, presumably from the perspective of the driver, Panis. The portrait of Panis is rendered in Opie’s trademark linear style, reducing the sitter to his most fundamental features and is set against a flattened brown backdrop.
The racetrack image on the left of the print takes up around two thirds of the composition, and shows a vast expanse of dark, flat tarmac. Opie’s use of vanishing point and low-view perspective works to create a dramatic composition, heightened by the fact that the scene is devoid of human presence.
Imagine You Are Driving (Fast)/Olivier is exemplary of the way in which Opie combines realism and abstraction to form his unique and highly recognisable style. Notably, the reflections on the sitter’s helmet and the small details along the side of the racetrack underline the sense of realism in the print. However, Opie’s use of saturated block colour and dark, thick outlines work to pare-back the images to the point of depersonalisation and abstraction.
Read more about Imagine You Are Driving (Fast) by Julian Opie.
ABOUT JULIAN OPIE
British artist Julian Opie challenges traditional approaches to portraiture through his digitally designed and seemingly contradictory, depersonalised works. Working also with landscapes and cityscapes, Opie’s highly stylised work involves the reduction of photographs or short films into figurative reproductions created using computer software. The hallmarks of his artistic style are portraits and animated walking figures, rendered with minimal detail in black line drawing. Learn more about Julian Opie.
