Lincoln's Bicentennial

11" x 8.5", pencil, 2009

All that talk about not sleeping to do those Abraham Lincoln illustrations for Union Pacific's celebration of his bicentennial from a commission by Bailey Lauerman, and only now am I getting around to an image-based post about it.

The client, UP, wanted more of a profile than I had originally drawn (and painted, as per my original instructions) and this is what I offered. As I was preparing the email to send this new drawing, I had a brainstorm that maybe it'd look pretty cool if he had his left hand on his lapel in a classic Lincoln pose. So I very quickly Photoshopped a version like that using elements of this one (below). The hand-on-lapel variation was approved, and you can see the final illustration, with the finished, new version of Abe Photoshopped over the previous ones' background here.

I also did the two steam engines that appear on the home page and the old-style decorative motifs that appear at the bottom of various pages. These illustrations will be used for a variety of purposes in a variety of ways...but for now, that's all you and I get.

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