Los Gatos artist Rick Tharp is sure San Francisco will be one of the two. And if it is, Tharp will have his artistic palate full.

More than two years ago, the Bay Area Sports Organizing Committee (BASOC)—the group that is putting forth a Herculean effort to bring the Olympics to the Bay Area in 2012—asked Tharp to oversee everything to do with design and graphics for their Olympic bid project. And this enormous job is a volunteer position.

Tharp—winner of the coveted international CLIO award for his Mirassou Vineyards branding and whose posters on child growth and development for BRIO Toys hang in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian Institute—accepted.

So BASOC dubbed Tharp their "design umpire," a job that Tharp says takes up well over half his time.

Sitting in his striking black and white studio, where bright red air ducts wind through the rafters, Tharp says, "I'm a living, breathing graphics design manual." His job is to make sure all the BASOC Olympic 2012 bid designs, on websites, posters, banners, bumper stickers—everything that is art in the environment—speaks from a common voice. "I have to make sure it all ties together," he says.

Creating identity graphics is one of the things Tharp does a lot of, especially in Los Gatos and Saratoga.

Tharp has created identity graphics (signage, menu designs, business cards, websites and more) for a number of Los Gatos fixtures: Steamers, Le Boulanger, Carrie Nation, Domus, and even Old Town, where he's kept his "Tharp Did It" studio for 27 years. He's designed the street signs for historic downtown Los Gatos and is currently designing the town's seasonal and permanent banners.

Tharp has done the same work for Saratoga businesses: the Mountain Winery, Hakone Gardens, Viaggio's Restaurant and Harmonie Day Spa.

He's designed posters for Cinequest and even created the logos for the parent company of this newspaper, Silicon Valley Community Newspapers, which also publishes the Saratoga News, Sunnyvale Sun, Campbell Reporter, Cupertino Courier and Willow Glen Resident.

Dressed in black slacks, a white shirt and black and white wingtips, Tharp bustles around his studio, then sits down to talk. "I work eight days a week," he says.

This year, much of Tharp's umpire work for BASOC has focused on a wildly successful Olympic poster project, something a bidding city has never done before. Twelve artists under the direction of Tharp volunteered their artistic time, materials and talent to create 12 posters, each one a different vision of the 2012 bid theme, The Bridge to the Future. These dynamic posters will be on display in the upper gallery at the Art Museum of Los Gatos at 4 Tait Ave. from Sept. 2 to Oct. 24. A formal reception will be held there on Oct. 10 from 7 to 9 p.m.

Photograph by George Sakkestad Rick Tharp hangs one of the 12 posters created to promote a Bay Area Olympics in 2012.

Last March Tharp's committee honed a list of 40 of the Bay Area's best artists and designers down to 12. "Narrowing down to 12 was very difficult," Tharp says. "We have so much talent in the Bay Area."

"These were the best of the best," says Helen Mendel, BASOC's director of marketing. Mendel says Tharp had prepared a list of alternates, but the first group was so excited to be part of the project, all 12 accepted.

The artists—Sharrie Brooks, David Lance Goines, Kit Hinrichs, Michael Mabry, Jennifer Morla, Jean Orlebeke, Ward Shumaker, Michael Schwab, Todd Simmons, Sam Smidt, Michael Vanderbyl and Min Wang—have each created posters with a completely different interpretation of the theme. To unify them, Tharp designed the format for the posters, which includes a black band that runs along the bottom of each poster, stating the theme The Bridge to the Future.

BASOC held three press conferences and unveiled four posters at each one. Each artist spoke at the press conferences, explaining his or her interpretation of the theme.

"Rick and I heard what the artists were saying and decided we needed to capture their words," Mendel says. So Tharp designed a small commemorative catalogue of the posters with quotes from each artist.

The first set of posters was auctioned off at $1,500.

"We put the posters up all over the city and people went crazy," Mendel says. "They tore them down and took them home." She says people began calling and emailing, wanting to buy them. "Everyone wants them," Mendel says.

Because San Francisco is not "yet" the designated host city for the 2012 Olympics, BASOC does not have retail rights to sell Olympic materials. So the posters are given as a gift to those who donate to BASOC. "You can't get just one poster," Tharp says. A donor of $270 will receive the full set of posters. Only 100 sets are signed. Mendel says collectors are scrambling for them.

Standing in his studio, where all 12 posters hang like shirts on a clothesline from a rope strung across the ceiling, Tharp says, "We've especially gotten many requests for the David Lance Goines poster by his collectors."

Before this project even began, a poster had been created by another well-known artist, Primo Angeli. He also created the 2012 Olympics-in-San-Francisco logo. Angeli is a veteran at Olympic posters. He designed commemorative posters for Salt Lake City, Atlanta and other Olympic host cities.

Creating a poster series as part of the bidding process is something new and took far more time than anyone expected, between all the logistics of the press conferences and getting the posters ready.

Mendel says the artists crowded into her office to sign their work. "My office is full of posters," she says.

Mendel was the one to get Tharp on board as the design umpire. The two have been working together on various projects since 1978. In fact, Tharp says, Mendel used to work down the hall from his Old Town studio. "Helen used to manage Old Town," Tharp says. Mendel, who now lives in Pleasanton, also produced the Los Gatos Art and Wine Festival throughout the mid to late '80s.

Tharp says he likes to work with people who believe in what they are doing and who have a personal attachment to their product. "I like it when there's a story to tell," he says. "Le Boulanger had a big story to tell, so I put it right on their bag." He says Le Boulanger actually started in Los Gatos but at a different location than the current one.

When it comes to passion and energy, Tharp has plenty. Mendel says BASOC wanted the "best" to take over the design part of the Olympics. "Rick is the best, and a very generous donor," she says. "He's a good model and always knows how to make things happen quickly."

And Tharp has a lot of Olympic energy to draw on in these South Bay foothills. Saratogan Greg Jamison, president and chief executive officer of the San Jose Sharks, serves on the board of directors of BASOC.

And a disproportionate number of Olympian alumni live in Monte Sereno and Los Gatos, including Peggy Fleming Jenkins, gold medal figure skater; Bob Jackson, swimmer; Feuebach, shot putter; Art Burns, discus thrower; David Popejoy, hammer thrower; Ellen Bertellotti, Paralympic swimmer; and Beretollotti's husband, James Chatwind, Paralympic javelin thrower. Swimmers Chris von Saltza, Los Gatos High School, and Carrie Steinseifer, Saratoga High, are two other Olympians raised in the area.

Ed Burke, a three-time Olympic hammer thrower, is the owner of the Los Gatos Athletic Club and served on the USOC for 20 years. He explains that in the late 1970s and '80s a large number of Olympic throwers came to Los Gatos for training. "They trained at Los Gatos High School," Burke says. After their Olympic Games, several got jobs here, bought homes and settled in. "This may be why we have such a high number," Burke says.

That may explain the numbers here, but the number of Olympians in the Bay Area is also disproportionately huge, surpassed in the United States only by Los Angeles. Many of these Olympians are serving on BASOC. In fact, of the 110 members of BASOC's board of directors, 20 percent are Olympians.

Burke, who resigned his post on the USOC, has taken a role in helping the 2012 bid along. He went with Dean Munro, executive director of the San Jose Sports Authority, and Anne Warner Cribbs, Olympian and chief executive officer of BASOC, to see San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown and convince him to get behind the 2012 bid. Mendel says Brown and Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown are both enthusiastic supporters.

"All mayors in the Bay Area are supporting this bid," Mendel says. In fact, the governor and the California legislature are all for it as well. But the political support is just one small part of the whole bidding process—a long, arduous task involving millions of dollars and thousands of volunteer hours by hundreds of people. "We've done most of the work in-house here in the Bay Area," Mendel says. "There is so much talent here that we haven't had to use consultants very much." She adds, "I'm sure we will win the domestic bid."

Tharp's eyes light up when he says, "I know we will win the bid." He's as caught up in the bidding excitement as if he were in a playoff game. "There is no other single event in the world that draws as many countries together as the Olympics," Tharp says.

And the work Tharp and his artists have done will become part of Olympic history whether San Francisco gets the bid or not. The commemorative posters are already collector's items.

But the battle for the domestic bid is just the first leg. After Nov. 2, when the USOC announces which city has been chosen, the winner must then compete with other cities around the world. The International Olympic Committee's final decision as to the host of the 2012 Olympics will be announced in 2005.

"We've got a good chance," Tharp says.