My inspiration for Cowboy Coolidge began with brainstorming the different ways someone can hurt another through self-absorption. I looked at various artists who had committed suicide and left a significant other, and the most prominent I found was Mark Rothko. Granted, the circumstances are slightly different. Rothko was diagnosed with a mild aortic aneurysm, and refused doctors orders to change personal habits that might have improved his condition. Because of his deteriorating health and impotence, he felt estranged from his wife and they separated. Two months later he overdosed on anti-depressants and slit his wrists.
The most prominent collection of Mark Rothko's work that comes to mind is the Rothko Chapel in Houston, Texas... Cowboy Country. This was the last collection of paintings he did, and he never saw the chapel in its completion.
The whole idea of art, suicide, and cowboys came together; three things I don't typically associate. Cowboys are known to be rough and tough, so to depict the vulnerability of one is interesting to me. Within all the crimes perpetrated against Helga, the culprits all have a strange sort of vulnerability to their character, and I thought a drawing based on the three and emulating Rothko's paintings would work well in that concept's favor.
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