Artspiration – Scott Harder

I’ve mentioned Scott on here before. 

http://www.scottharder.ca/ 

I don’t know who is responsible for this site, but I hope some more of his terrific art goes up in addition to the images that are already there. There was a lot more to him than the paltry 11 images that are there. But I’m glad something is up. He deserves to be recognized for the exceptional talent that he was.

I have exceptionally fond memories of hanging out with Scott, his pencils and pens moving effortlessly across paper, his lines rendering magical imagery, listening to all sorts of music, where he would often express amazingly deep ideas about it, to talking about art, discussing everything from Syd Meads’ set designs to whether Peter Saville was worth the hype. He was paradoxically an innocent mennonite lad on one hand, and an amazingly sophisticated and worldly guy on the other. He would come to visit me and hang out for hours, doodling and sketching, looking through my library of books, uttering zingers that had me in stitches. He was a very analogue illustrator, but he would often sit and watch me work on the computer and ask questions that demonstrated he probably already had a very good grasp on them and that once he got on one and got the hang of it, he would go far – very far.

Sadly this wasn’t to be.

Tragically, on Dec.6, 2000 his fiancé found him dead. What made it even sadder was that they were due to be married a few weeks later. There was no sign of violence or accident, certainly no sign of drug use or suicide. It was a mystery to all concerned. Later an autopsy revealed that Scott had died of cardiomyopathy, scarring on his heart. The doctor asked if Scott had been an invalid. No! He was incredibly active, and had played sports all his life. The doctor said that given the damage to his heart, it was amazing he could even climb a set of stairs let alone ride a bike across town to play ball hockey and then ride back. Given his vitality and his age, no one thought to check him for any abnormalities. It snuck up on him and likely took him completely unawares.

The tenth image on the link above was a poster he did for Brawd clothing.

When I came back to London after the funeral, I was walking home and saw the poster hanging up in a clothing store that I shopped in occasionally. I had passed that poster a bunch of times, saw Scott working on it, liked it a lot, but now it had a whole other significance. I went in.

“This may seem like a weird question, but how much do you want for that poster? The illustrator of that was a really good friend and I just came back from his funeral yesterday. It would mean a whole lot to me to have it and if you....
“Oh you can have it. We’re about to take it down anyway. You can have it right now actually.”
I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to cry or kiss the guy. I offered to pay him for it, but he declined. So I bought a bunch of shirts and a wad of stickers from them instead. And then also gave him something nice a week later. :-)

It was late on a Sunday afternoon, so I raced down to the art supply store up the block before they closed and bought a tube to put the poster in. The next day I took it down to a framer to mount it. It still hangs on my wall to this day, amd it will hang on my wall forever.

I miss you Scott.

You were a fine human being and I feel richer and blessed for the chance to have known you.