Eric Clapton for Music Traveler Magazine

This illustration iss about none other than Erik Clapton. He was the guitar player for The Yardbirds, Cream, Derek and the Dominos, Blind faith, a solo artist and also very good friend of George Harrison (the guitar player of the Beatles).

But he was also very much in love with George’s girlfriend, the model named: Pattie Boyd. She is known to be the biggest muse in Rock ‘n Roll history. Not only did George write the huge hit ‘Something’ with the Beatles about her, but Eric Clapton wrote his hit ‘Layla’ about her too! Imagine two gigantic rocksongs being written about you... :)

He called the song ‘Layla’ instead of ‘Pattie’ because the song is based upon the Persian lovepoem of Layla and Majnun, by the 12th century Iranian poet Nizami Ganjavi. Majnun is the main character in this story, and has fallen madly in love with the woman Majnun, which he cannot marry, just like Eric couldn’t win over Pattie’s heart when he wrote this song.

That’s why I thought it would be fitting to give this illustration a Persian/Middle Eastern vibe. I turned Eric and Pattie into Layla and Majnun, sitting beside a desert oasis, drinking tea.