I think the album cover for our upcoming record — Over The Grave: The Hymns Of Isaac Watts, Volume One — looks fabulous. In fact, all of the album art, packaging and text inserts are so amazing that it would be well worth owning a physical CD rather than just a download (although the music will be available on iTunes and other digital stores). When I saw the cover art, I immediately wanted to ask the artists about it. So that’s what I did. And now, Sojourn visual artist Mickie Winters and record producer/songwriter/musician/graphic designer Neil Robins tell their story:
From Mickie Winters:
The artwork for the Over the Grave album was inspired by the second coming of Christ. The reality is that all who believe and trust in the Lord will be united with the Creator of life when Christ returns.
The ground full of skulls represents death and the grave. The figures being removed from the ground hover over the “grave” and represent every man, woman, and child that will be raised to unite with Christ upon his return.The skeleton figure alongside the man, woman, and child figures represents those who have died before us that will join us in heaven. The tree with roots extending to the figures “over the grave” symbolizes the tree of life bringing new life to those figures. The dominant color to the album is red to symbolize Christ’s blood over everything, illuminating the image the way Christ’s blood illuminates our lives and allows new life to begin.
From Neil Robins:
Mickey Winters submitted a design I liked very much for the album art. I felt it was a good choice to have clear themes of Life, Death, Judgement and Mercy incorporated in the art because those are the strongest themes on the record. She, Michael (Winters) and I got together to discuss the direction for the design and what the best treatment for Mickey’s art would be on the cover.
The conclusion was for me to recreate the art with higher resolution, and to make it appear as if the art was cut out of real materials, laid on a surface and photographed - even though the art was to be made in the digital realm. I chose the rich colors and earthy textures to match the album art to the production approach of the record. The record is tonally warm, with layers of intricate parts and I felt the art should reflect that.
The cover fonts were chosen to emit a sort of 70’s movie poster vibe. The album does sort of have an early 70’s approach and attitude…and in parts, it feels cinematic. All other fonts were chosen to feel like an ld Isaac Watts hymnal. The end goal was to make the album art, in some way, give you a feel for what you were about to get into when you experienced the music for the first time.
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