Artist Peter Hristoff (BFA 1981 Fine Arts)—a longtime SVA faculty member who teaches in the BFA Design, BFA Fine Arts and BFA Visual & Critical Studies departments, as well as the Continuing Education division—created the first 2022 poster in SVA’s long-running “subway series,” its advertising campaign created for display in New York City’s subway stations. Hristoff’s contribution could be seen on platforms throughout the boroughs starting last month.

The Hristoff poster’s image—the silhouette of a man holding a bouquet of tulips like a megaphone or horn, announcing the news of spring—comes from one of his online drawing classes from last year. He often gives imaginative prompts and props to the figure models he works with, and will occasionally draw alongside his students to engage and encourage them.

“The silhouette is something I’ve worked with for years, and tulips are also a favorite subject of mine,” he says. “Tulip mania”—an irrational runup and subsequent crash in tulip-bulb prices in 17th-century Europe—“was like an early version of cryptocurrency speculation.”

Working with Peter Kruty Editions in Brooklyn, Hristoff created a series of five letterpress images based on the model-drawing session, choosing the pose for the poster for its “heraldic” and joyful quality, emphasized by the flowers’ transition from black to red—an effect achieved in the printmaking process, rather than digitally altered after the fact.

In March, Hristoff presented “Memento Istanbul,” an autobiographical exhibition about his Bulgarian family’s history and migration to Turkey in the early 20th century, at the Yapi Kredi Cultural Center in Istanbul. In May, C.A.M. Gallery, Istanbul, will present “Flower Passage,” a solo exhibition of new work.

Check out the new subway poster video below, in which Hristoff explains how he developed his unique artistic sensibilities, his tendency towards the silhouette and the process of creating this poster.