Harland Miller

Harland Miller's paintings are unusual in the range of current contemporary art in that they are, first, self-evidently painterly paintings and, second, companionable; they can make you laugh. I remember the first time I came across the Hemingway painting I'm So Fucking Hard - it was propped against the wall in a studio, an appropriately imposing object, about 6ft by 4ft - I laughed out loud. Ditto its companion painting, Dirty Northern Bastard, attributed to DH Lawrence. Also Not Bi-curious by Norman Mailer. I could go on. Miller has painted a portrait of Hemingway as part of a series of pictures based on the black-and-white mugshots of writers from the covers of their books; it's Hemingway in his "Papa" role, all rugged fisherman's sweater and macho bonhomie, in the famous shot by Karsh of Ottawa. But I'm So Fucking Hard, in common with all of Harland Miller's best-known work, has no image other than the title and the familiar furniture of old Penguin paperbacks: the stylised cloud-shape at the top, the plucky penguin at the bottom, and the broad bands of white and belisha orange. These, along with the pelican, the puffin and other familiar Allen Lane zoo-world logos - innovative when they were introduced in the 1930s, nostalgia-laden now - are emblems that Miller has painted dozens, maybe hundreds of times, sometimes free-form, sometimes in a more or less literal way.