My first design history instructor was turning 50. I wanted to give him something nice that also pays homage to the subject he was teaching.
Starting out with Paul Rand’s poster for IBM (link) as a guide, I replaced the company’s logos with numbers. It was serendipitous that Rand used logos like confetti in several cases. Each number represents a student gathering around the 50 year old birthday boy. At that time, I was the black 27.
Knowing as much as he does, the receiver got the reference as soon as I handed him the poster.