The Most Special Day of My Life: Works by Rob Clayton & Christian Clayton

Rob and Christian Clayton make paintings the way a conversation gets made: one brother starts a canvas, hands it to the other, and the second redirects or overwrites what the first put down until neither can claim it. This first book is the record of that method.

Published in 2003 by La Luz de Jesus Press with Last Gasp of San Francisco, the volume runs to 184 pages of color and duotone plates and holds individual paintings by each brother alongside the collaborations, with essays by Michael Criley, Jeff Kling, Long Gone John and the artists. Their subjects are narrative and autobiographical, drawn from memories of suburban decay, and the book documents installations as well as pictures — among them Tim House, a six-by-eight-by-thirteen-foot church-schoolhouse hung inside with portraits of people real and imagined. Designed by Mark Murphy, it is built to be sampled rather than read straight through.

Rob Clayton (b. 1963) and Christian Clayton (b. 1967) both graduated from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, where they went on to teach illustration, and began collaborating in the mid-1990s. Their work sits alongside the lowbrow and pop-surrealist artists who came out of La Luz de Jesus in Los Angeles, and has extended into film, music video and print campaigns.