In all of my cross-country trips, one of the most vivid On-the-Road experiences came while driving across Kansas in the middle of the night in my 87 Saab. The only car for several horizons, forever surrounded by rolling green hills lit up by a sky unlike anything known in the West, I had the satisfying feeling that there wasn't anywhere in the world I'd rather be - a feeling that is hard to find when traveling without a destination. I knew that was a moment to never forget. Using my own photography from cross-country trips in various old automobiles, I designed this book jacket to illustrate those long midnight drives into the dark blue horizon.
The lure of the American road is perhaps best described by E.B. White - "Everything in life is somewhere else, and you can get there in a car". But it wasn't until Kerouac penned On the Road in three weeks in 1951 that the spirit of interstate travel was brought to life for a younger generation. The urgency, style, and simplicity with which Kerouac describes his journey brought countless generations out from their hometowns in the search of a new America.
The simple idea that the road outside my house was the same road as the one in California - that concept is all I needed to go there.
