My dad and the making of the iceberg Image

During my Masters studies in Sweden we were presented with a concept called ‘The Iceberg.’ I was floored to see an image I grew up with in Los Angeles re-appear so far away and so unexpectedly. My dad did artistic direction in the printing industry and always brought home books of images which us kids would use for collages. The most memorable book was square with crisp, bright images. On the cover was the iceberg with a comic inside enticing the investigation of an attached CD-ROM. It was an image that felt personal even though I would see it in advertising sometimes. I hadn’t thought much about it in a long time- not until until graduate school. I recently took a walk along the beach with my dad and asked him about the image. The iceberg image, as it turns out, holds the history of the digitization of imagery, search optimization and Microsofts takeover.

Here is my dad, Roy Woolner, explaining how it all came to be: