SAN DIEGO, CA. (www.shadowlightstudios.com) - Shadowlightstudios.com is proud to announce the offering on ebay of original cover art from Santana's 1979 album 'Marathon' by American artist John Paul Jones.
From 1975 to 1981, John Paul worked on Santana's 'Moonflower,''Oneness; Silver Dreams, Golden Reality,' 'Marathon' and 'Zebop' albums, along with Van Morrison's 'Common One' album, with the support of Bill Graham's management. Both Santana and Morrison exercise total creative control of their music and promotional packaging. They also extend to the visual artist they work with the same freedom of expression they give the musicians they play with.
Shadowlight will be offering other original art from John Paul's Santana Collection. VIsit https://www.shadowlightstudios.com to see John Paul's gallery and his latest cd album cover for Jamie's 'Music From A Love Shared,' released 2004 on Shadowlight Music.
Visit link for presentation of this original album art at https://www.shadowlightstudios.com/santana/art.html
Make a bid on Ebay for John Paul's 'Marathon' album cover original R print at https://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3834493134
Bidding closes on Ebay for purchase of original 'Marathon' cover art and sleeve design elements on Aug 28, 2004.
The Story of the Original Cover Art of Santana's 'Marathon LP by John Paul Jones
In 1979, Carlos Santana gave me some pictures of classical Greek urns that had runners as their motif. He asked me to develop a design for his next album, 'Marathon'. He also told me that Tony Lane, the great art director at CBS and of Fantasy Records fame wanted to design 'Marathon' and was developing a concept.
R Prints were Kodak's answer to cybachrome prints, a direct from slide, positive to positive print process. Negatives did not have to be made. They had more contrast than C Prints, prints done from negs or internegs, but they had great color saturation and were faster and cheaper to make. Many ad agencies started using them for roughs for their final art. Eventually, labs like Color 2000, which I represented in it's first year in San Francisco, were producing R Prints you could make film seperations from for national publications.
At the time of 'Marathon', I was sharing a studio with photographers Rick White and Peter Donaldson, a very special studio due to it's history. Peter and I made the print in a dark room that was part of what was once Ferlingetti's glassed studio on the roof of City Lights Books. A steep and narrow staircase led from a second floor office to the roof studio and roof garden that looked out on China town, the Downtown skyline, Broadway and North Beach.
Using three slide projectors, a slide of the runners urn, and a slide I shot in my fireplace which I duped and flipped for projection. I saw wings immediately in the flames, Harley-Davidson kind of wings. Then I saw the double image that I was looking for. I was hoping to find a double image as an homage to the first Santana album cover loved by so many.
I cropped and traced the images for position.
First exposing the runners, then one flame shot, flipping it and exposing it again gave me an 8'X 10' R print that would be seperated for the cover. The black mat cropped the runners to make their positive forms the negative space and the negative backround a more positive form, enhancing the double image.
The original inking of the marathon logo lettering is included with this bid as well as an original inking of a laurel design element used on the lyric sleeve of the album. Framing of these three elements will be done to buyers specifications. All elements are signed by the artist, John Paul Jones. A print proof of the front and back cover is available to compliment original elements for the framing presentation.
As to what the double image is, if you don't see it, you'll have to buy it to find out what it is. When Tony Lane placed my design next to the one he developed, he looked at me and said '%#!& you, John Paul,' and I knew he loved it.
