Images Around the World

Images Around The Worldnby: Bill Tranthamnn I was one of those dragged kicking and screaming into the computer age. I don't adapt well to change. Up until a few short years ago, I considered "high tech" to be moving from eight track to cassette and still believed that being a "geek" was a bad thing.
The turning point came one day at work. A very patient co-worker enticed me to sit down at his desk and try his computer. He connected to the internet, then told me to just "type in anything you want to see." I took a deep breath and clumsily entered "art" into the little search window.
Looking back, the impact of that moment ranks right up there with such important life experiences as learning to ride a bike without training wheels and getting your driver's license; just below getting married and having children. I was flat out amazed! And immediately addicted.
What charged me up the most was the idea of creating an original image; a drawing or painting, and being able to convert that image into digital data that could be fed into a system that could so effortlessly reached the entire world!
To date, I have sustained my initial amazement and still get goose bumps when I visit a website of someone living on the other end of the planet and find one of my drawings being displayed. And, it is still a special kick to think about all the caricatures I've drawn and how many of them are hanging on the walls in homes and offices all over the world.
I suppose you need to have lived through the technological transitions of the past fifty years; from tubes to transistors to microchips, to truly appreciate the wonderment of it all.
I guess the best way to comprehend how meaningful the computer has become to me and my artwork is to think that somewhere in the middle of Australia is a very nice family whom I, no doubt, will never actually meet with a large framed drawing hanging on their livingroom wall. They see it everyday; it is part of their lives together, a family heirloom, perhaps. I drew it for them and that makes me feel very good.
I once dreamed that someday I would create a "great work of art". It would hang in some obscure gallery with a little brass plate bearing my name, gathering dust. I may not have created greatness, but my little images have touched many hundreds of lives and added a bit of sincere meaning to the life of an otherwise undiscovered and frustrated artist.