Today we’d like to share with you a series of collages made by Chris Barker, a professional art director and illustrator from London, who since 2016 has paid tribute to all the famous people who pass away each year. What’s really unique about it is the theme based on the popular album cover by The Beatles, “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”, released in 1967.

Bored Panda wanted to find out more about this unique project. This is why we got in touch with Chris Barker. We asked him how the idea of paying tribute to celebrities who passed away came about. The author of the images shared with us: “I started doing this in 2016 when there seemed to be a mass exodus of the great and good from this planet, beginning with David Bowie in January and continuing right to the bitter end with George Michael and Carrie Fisher. It had felt like such a monumental, weird year what with Brexit and Trump that I felt I had to do something to remember it by. I released the original montage the day after the Trump election and then almost immediately had to update it when Leonard Cohen died the next day.”

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2023

Image credits: christhebarker

The author of the Sgt. Pepper’s-inspired images continued: “Then they just kept on going and going and so I had to keep updating it until it had gathered so much momentum it felt like it was all everyone was talking about that year. I never intended to do it again as it had been so all-encompassing but I got talked into it. And then again the next year and the next. So now I’ve resigned myself to doing it every year. I don’t know how I’ve become this bizarre custodian of international grief and memoriam but people seem to like it and it doesn’t do anyone any harm!”

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

Chris also told us more about how he keeps track of all the people passing away: “Because people pay such close attention to it, I have started keeping a list over the course of the year. I used to just cram it into the final month but now I start thinking about the arrangement around September/October time.”

“I don’t find research particularly taxing as I am bombarded with messages and on social media every time anyone famous dies. People take it quite seriously!”

2022

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

We also asked Barker about the creative process behind putting a montage of all the people in one image together. We learned that: “The part I find most rewarding is the composition. Arranging characters in relevant clusters. I always try to sneak a few little narratives in there and I enjoy it when people notice them without me pointing them out.”

Asked whose death among all the celebrities featured in his collages had the most personal impact on Chris, he answered: “People ask me whose death I have been affected most by. Obviously, all of them are real people with real friends and family and so they are all sad. Often it is someone less well known dying that moves me most. This year was, I think, the first time I’ve had to include a celebrity on the montage who I know was a fan of my work. That was weirdly affecting. (Model and presenter Annabel Giles).”

Image credits: christhebarker

2021

Image credits: christhebarker

Lastly, we were wondering if Barker plans to continue creating the same montages every year now. He said: “I used to say ‘this is the last time I’m ever doing this’ the first few years. Then I got used to it. But this year did feel rather overwhelming and is the closest I’ve come to saying never again in a while. I think it was because I started early. I’d had the idea of what to do with Sinead O’Connor ripping up the photograph way back in the summer and I’d been patiently sitting on the idea since then. I think that made me go early. This was the biggest count I’ve done as well. That can’t help but make you a bit depressed. But like I say, people like it. It’s like a cross between the in memoriam section at the Oscars and Where’s Wally (or Waldo if you’re American).

I may well stop doing it when I reach ten. I mean, I can’t go on forever, can I?”

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

2020

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

2019

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

Image credits: christhebarker

2018

Image credits: christhebarker

2017

Image credits: christhebarker

2016

Image credits: christhebarker

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