When I moved into a new apartment in New York in 1975, I got lucky in a way you can’t plan. The neighbor on my floor was John Cross, a senior creative director at a major ad agency. I was still a beginning photographer, trying to find my footing, and suddenly I had someone right next door who understood images, storytelling, and how the real world of assignments actually worked. We became friendly, and before long, he and his wife, Linda invited us up to their country farmhouse in upstate New York.

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That is where Cross's Flowers happened, photographed in 1978, quiet, simple, and in my painterly mood. I wasn’t thinking about markets or “branding.” I was just doing what I always do, chasing mood, light, and a feeling that stays with you.

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Then something big happened. That image became the back cover of my 3rd book Moods, published in 1980. And because of that book, I was invited into the poster world, which at the time was enormous internationally. Cross's Flowers became my first published poster in 1980, released by Bruce McGaw, along with a nude called Curves. That one opening led to an unexpected run, seventy-three posters published by multiple publishers worldwide.

 

And I mean everywhere. I would walk into places and see my posters on walls I never imagined, elegant homes, small neighborhood bars, Burger King, even above a urinal which still makes me laugh. It gave my career a real jumpstart, and it taught me something I never forgot, an image can travel farther than you think.

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Here is the irony, decades later, I’m bringing that poster idea back to life, but in a completely different way. I stopped publishing posters after the 1980s on purpose, I wanted to protect the fine art side of my work. What RDO is doing now is not a return to “posters” the way they used to be. These are collectible prints, produced with the same archival care and museum-level standards as my gallery work, created so a new generation of collectors can start collecting from fifty years of images without needing to climb a financial mountain to do it.

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So Cross' Flowers means a lot to me. It is a memory, a turning point, and a full-circle moment. Back then, it helped launch something huge. Now it is here again, not as a throwback, but as a collectible, handled with the same respect I give my museum and gallery prints.