Art Spiegelman, It Was Today, Only Yesterday..., 2012, hand-painted and etched glass, Midtown East Campus, Manhattan

It Was Today, Only Yesterday… is a 17 panel hand-painted stained glass installation created by cartoonist and High School of Art and Design alumnus, Art Spiegelman. Bursting with color, the comic book style mural portrays three scenes of the artist at work in environments representing the past, present, and future. The piece shows how an artist develops over time and includes subtle autobiographical references positioned throughout. A humorous illustration of the creative process embodies the central ‘Today’ panel showing the artist’s brain receiving doses of Inspiration, Perspiration, and Craft from amusing flying characters, counterbalanced with a blast of Self Doubt to the forehead. Six individually stylized panels depict different forms of artistic expression including graphic design, cartooning, illustration, fashion, photography, film, drawing, painting, architecture, and new media – all subjects taught at the school. As an additional gesture to the school and acknowledgement of its past, Spiegelman has dedicated an entire panel to a series of clever caricatures of illustrious school alumni. Pulling all the components together, Spiegelman describes his work as follows:  “As students and faculty walk through the high school corridor that overlooks the cafeteria, they can see and be seen, moving back and forth between yesterday and tomorrow in a work about Work.”