Can I avoid writing to the screen until a couple seconds before X11 is initialized?

Question

On an embedded device running Linux, I am writing to the monitor from the bootloader (U-Boot) to display a given logo. Once the linux kernel is loaded, however, it clears the screen until X11 is initialized. Is there any way I can avoid writing to the screen until shortly (a couple seconds) before X11 is initialized? Having an unsightly blank screen for ten seconds is bound to scare some end-users.