GARCIA

How this Jerry Garcia album cover came to be

In 1972 Jerry Garcia invited artist/photographer Bob Seidemann to create a cover for his first solo album. What follows is an account of how it came to be. It is part of an interview with Mr. Seidemann.

"Jerry was doing his first solo album, and when the mix was virtually finished, he invited me into the studio at 1:30 or 2 o'clock in the morning to listen to it. He and I sat at the control room board and I conjured up that image for him. I said, 'I see a wheel,' as if I was having a vision. 'A wheel of fortune floating over a female form symbolizing life, and the wheel symbolizes geared chance and the industrial age, and as the hand reaches through the hole in the center of the wheel of fortune, it's cut off by a numbered playing card. Let's keep it clean -- just numbers, just digits. Let's get the hand up.' Jerry said, 'What hand?' I said, 'Your right hand,' and he almost jumped out of his chair. He flinched as though he'd been electrically shocked. At that time, most people did not know that one of the great players in American rock 'n' roll was missing a finger on his right hand. He thought long and hard about it. I said, 'A subtle secondary image is an American flag -- there's a blue field, with a red and white stripe. The female form is white, the red panel is the red and white stripes, and the blue field is the star field, and the hand ascends into the heavens, severed from the body by the card of chance. The numbers on the knobs [there are four black knobs on the red field] -- NGC 205 and so on -- are actual coordinates for galaxies in our sector.' And he went for it. He kind of shook his head and smiled and said, 'OK, let's do it.'"

This image, created decades before Photoshop was made using techniques that are now virtually lost to photography. It is a blending of six different photographs put together by hand with air brush, paint, sand paper and glue among other things. This work required great skill and a fine eye. As digital technology replaces the photo/chemical process these prints will become even more collectable.