Black Death 3 : TRANSMigra early works Pt I

A bike fabricator in East Tennessee met an artist in Asheville, North Carolina. That's not us; it's a movie poster.

Our first collaboration was a replica of a cult classic bike - the Black Death 3 from 1991 smash hit Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man. Above is a screen grab from the flick, the bike ridden by Mickey Rourke. He played the title role of "Harley Davidson" alongside Don Johnson as "The Marlboro Man"

 This is allegedly one of the Black Deaths in an aged state, perhaps the original Black Death 1 transferred from Mickey Rourke to Chuck Zito for restoration. These bikes were built by Gene Thomason of Bartels Harley Davidson in Los Angeles. The artwork provides quite a challenge as the hand painted lettering with skull and cards emblem is both iconic and unrefined.

 As you can see, many have tried to create replicas but have missed the mark.

Our bike builder Jay is not one to miss the mark. Here the bike is shown near completion, with the modified softail gas tank bearing only stencil outlines for the painter to do his magic.

 

Here we also enter into the mysterious relationship with this gas tank and multiple washing machines . . .

Our painter is also a perfectionist in his own right, and found the lettering to be a bit off. The biggest challenge was to add some meat to HARLEY DAVIDSON with very little breathing room in the letter registration.

Not bad for our first attempt . . .

Somehow Jeremiah managed to cut himself with a paint marker.

 In the early days, a crappy camera was involved to ensure authenticity.

We were able to reach that elusive zone between unpolished roughness and iconic presence.

Jay put his heart and soul into matching every detail of the bike within his control and the availability of parts. With the bike complete, it was delivered to an anonymous distributor and sold to a mysterious buyer in a land far away.