Video: Kings of the Queen City
As we continue into our inaugural MLS season, we opened our first home game with an homage to one of Cincinnati’s influential artists: Charley Harper. You may have recognized the style from the Artworks mural with the bluebirds flanking a white bird feeder (119 East Court Street), based on Harper’s “Homecoming,” but both Charley and his wife, Edie, left more of an impact than just sprucing up the downtown area with some color on a building or two.
Charley and Edie maintained a large focus on creating art based on the wildlife around them at home in Cincinnati and across the country. From prints to books to photography to various forms of art for parks and wildlife organizations, the Harpers produced a lot of art across a number of mediums and poured into places that cared about art and nature. The couple had similar styles that Charley referred to as “minimal realism” and is identifiable by reducing objects to basic shapes, using as few details as possible while maintaining the ability to easily recognize the subject.
To commemorate the win and the momentous occasion, we will be selling posters of last night’s tifo with proceedes going back into the tifo fund. As usual, we want to replenish the tifo fund for the next display so proceeds will contribute to covering some of those materials. Since we were inspired by a local artist whose art makes this city more fun and vibrant, we also wanted to also direct a portion of proceeds to Artworks, the organization behind the giant murals around the city (and other public art installations, as well). Keep an eye out in the coming days for the preorder link to secure your own “Kings of the Queen City” tifo poster.
P.S. If you’re looking to see their work in person, there are murals by Charley in the Duke Convention center as well as the Federal Building and, if you have a spare afternoon, take some time to check out the other murals downtown. Both Charley and Edie have works adapted into murals on the sides of buildings and Artworks has a map to make it easy to go on a self-guided tour that includes those two along with many other murals in the city’s core.