Daily Art Fixx

visual arts blog, painting, drawing, sculpture, illustration and more!

Fourth of July: Saturday Evening Post Covers

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saturday-evening-post-j-c-leyendecker-sleeping-uncle-sam-1924Happy Fourth of July to all of our American friends and fans!  In honour of this day, DAF presents a collection of Fourth of July covers from one of America’s most enduring magazines – The Saturday Evening Post. Most of these images were created by J.C. Leyendecker but there are a few others, including the very first Fourth of July themed covers by Guernsey Moore in 1900 and J.J. Gould in 1903.  The magazine seems to have abandoned the idea after 1953 except for the most recent cover by Eric Bowman in 2009.

Have a great holiday everyone!

Source: Saturday Evening Post

J. C. Leyendecker: 1874-1951

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Saturday Evening Post Cover-J.C. Leyendecker 1936Born on March 23, 1874, in Montabour, Germany, Joseph Christian Leyendecker was  America’s most popular and successful commercial artist in the early decades of the 20th century.

In 1882, the Leyendecker family immigrated to Chicago, Illinois where his mother’s uncle had founded the McAvoy Brewing Company. After studying drawing and anatomy under John H. Vanderpoel at the Chicago Art Institute, J. C. and his brother Frank traveled to Paris where they studied at the Académie Julian. During this time they were exposed to the work of Toulouse-Lautrec, Jules Chéret, Alfons Mucha, and the French Art Nouveau movement. The brother’s returned to America in 1899 and in that same year, J.C. received his first commission for a Saturday Evening Post cover. It was the first of over 320 covers he would create for the Post, as well as many advertisement illustrations for the magazine’s interior pages. Leyendecker’s most well known work for the post was the New Year’s Baby. For close to forty years, the Post featured a Leyendecker Baby on its New Year’s covers.

Leyendecker also made a name for himself through his illustrations for the Arrow brand of detachable shirt collars.  Leyendecker created his “Arrow Collar Man”, a handsome, smartly dressed man who became the “symbol of fashionable American manhood.” Charles A. Beach was the original Arrow Collar model. Beach was Leyendecker’s assistant, business agent, and companion – a relationship that lasted nearly 50 years.

As well, Leyendecker designed posters for the World War I and World War II efforts that inspired many Americans to support the cause.  His sports posters which often promoted Ivy League football, baseball and crew teams, were widely collected by college students.

Leyendecker also created advertisements for The House of Kuppenheimer, Ivory Soap, and Kelloggs, as well as covers for other magazines including Collier’s and Success.

Leyendecker reached the height of his fame in the 1930’s. “His popularity grew from his ability to establish a specific and readily identifiable signature style.  With his very wide, deliberate stroke done with authority and control, he seldom overpainted, preferring to interest the viewer with the omissions as well as the parts included. Leyendecker’s approach to his career influenced the art of illustration and he became a mentor to an entire generation of younger artists, most notably Norman Rockwell, who began his career by emulating Leyendecker.”

By the end of the 1930s, Leyendecker’s grew less popular. He painted his last cover for the Post shortly after the U.S.A entered World War II.  “Though few today recognize the name Leyendecker, his work was some of the most popular of its day, owing to his ability to convey the essence of both everyday life in America and international events through paintings that reflected his unique sense of drama, romanticism and humor.”

J. C. Leyendecker died of a heart attack on July 25, 1951. He is buried alongside his parents and brother Frank at Woodlawn Cemetery in Bronx, New York.

Sources: Wikipedia, National Museum of American Illustration, The Haggin Museum,

Movie Poster Art: A Short History

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I am a huge movie fan and I’m always pleased when I see an artistically crafted film poster.  This led me to do a little research into the history of movie poster artwork and its evolution over the years.

Film posters have always been designed with the commercial intent of getting movie goers to buy a ticket. It is generally thought that the first movie poster was created in 1890 by French painter and lithographer Jules Cheret for a short film called “Projections Artistiques”.  Most of the early film posters prior to 1910 were simple signs with block text announcing the title, producer, and director.

As the movie industry began to grow,  studios realized the marketing value of creating colourful artwork that depicted scenes from their movies to promote the films and bring in more viewers. These posters were printed on inexpensive paper and not meant to be collected or preserved. The posters were usually loaned to the theatres who were responsible for returning them to the studios or sending them to the next theatre.

Another form of movie promotion existed in the form of Lobby Cards – small (14 x 11 inch)   movie posters usually printed on cardstock that were displayed in a lobby’s foyer. The cards were often produced in sets of eight or more and depicted scenes from the movie.

From the mid 1920’s through the 1940’s, movie studios developed their own artwork styles for their movie posters and hired well-known artists and illustrators such as Al Hirschfeld, John Held Jr., Hap Hadley, Ted Ireland, Louis Fancher, Clayton Knight and Armando Seguso.  MGM was known for it’s highly polished posters that used pastel colour schemes on white backgrounds. 20th Century Fox, on the other hand, used rich and vibrant colours in their posters to promote their movies (typically musicals).  As well, the increasing public preference for colour photographic quality prompted Columbia Pictures to pioneer the “fake colour” process which colourized black and white still photos. It was not long before every studio adopted this process.

Very few film posters survived the years of the Great Depression and World War Two where theatre owners often received credit for returning the poster and paper drives during the war kept movie posters out of circulation.  It is estimated that less than 20 copies of most film posters that were produced between 1930 – 1945 exist today.

Up until the mid 1980’s, the National Screen Service (NSS) printed and distributed almost all movie posters and related advertising material for the film studios. The evolution of multi-screen cinemas meant that studios could cut back on distribution and the need for  production and distribution by the NSS was eliminated.  During this transition period, many poster exchanges still had large inventories of products and some evolved into the business of re-selling the posters to collectors.

Today, collecting film posters is a popular hobby and studios typically print extra posters for the collector’s market.  Old and rare posters are extremely valuable and many are auctioned off for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

As the modern costs of printing rises, many studios are choosing to promote their films online and through television.  As well, many theatres are going digital and replacing traditional back-lit poster frames with video screens that can display the film poster with very little effort. Whether this means that studios will stop spending money on that uniquely created, iconic film poster, in favour of less expensive alternatives is yet to be seen.  My guess is that it will be a bit of both. Artistic creativity  in promotional materials, whatever the medium, will continue to be an important aspect of those films that strive for originality and artistic quality.

What do you think?  What is your all-time favourite movie poster?  Use the comment section to share your thoughts. You can also upload an image of your favourite poster.  (please keep the size under 100kb)

Sources: FilmPosters.com, Wikipedia, Movie Goods, Smashing Magazine,

George Underwood: Painting

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Underwood 002

Born in 1947, George Underwood studied at Beckenham Art School in 1963. During his studies, Underwood became more and more interested in music and pursued a career in that field. Along with life long friend David Bowie he made one record (The King Bees ) and also a solo record under the name Calvin James.

George returned to art studies and then worked in design studios as an illustrator. Initially he specialised in fantasy, horror and science fiction book covers.

Underwood’s colleagues in the music business asked him to do paintings for them which led him to become a freelance artist. Art work for the first T Rex album and later David Bowie’s Hunky Dory and Ziggy Stardust album covers established him as a leading and creative art illustrator. Over this period Underwood produced thousands of book covers, LP and CD covers, advertisements, portraits and drawings.

In the 1970’s Underwood started painting in oils. His paintings were influenced by the Viennese School of Fantastic Realism – Ernst Fuchs, Rudolph Hausner and Eric Brauer who were contemporary visionaries like Breughel and Bosh. He was fascinated by their mix of fantasy and realism.

Underwood’s paintings are held in many private art collections including David Bowie, who says: “There’s a sublime isolation surrounding his subjects that really touches the viewer, the figures being both heroic and vulnerable simultaneously.” (bio from artist website)

To see more of George Underwood’s work, visit GeorgeUnderwood.com.

Cover Art: Saturday Evening Post

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Saturday Evening Post - June 2009

Continuing my exploration of cover art, today I take a look at magazines, specifically the infamous Saturday Evening Post. But first a little history:

Advances in printing technology during the Industrial Revolution allowed for the work of talented illustrators to be reproduced with increasing quality. Early publishers focused much of their attention on the magazine’s cover, which like today, is a big selling attraction. Eye-catching covers increase circulation, and ensure the magazines continuation.

The Saturday Evening Post is one of the oldest publications in America and it’s predecessor, the Pennsylvania Gazette, was first published in 1728 by Benjamin Franklin.  It became known as The Saturday Evening Post in 1821 and was initially a four-page newspaper with no illustrations and featured controversial political articles.

In 1897, magazine publisher Cyrus H. K. Curtis purchased the financially troubled magazine for one thousand dollars. George Horace Lorimer, editor from 1899-1936 conceived of covers featuring artwork or illustrations. His idea increased the  magazine’s advertising as well as the success of The Saturday Evening Post.

The magazine became famous for its cover artwork with humorous scenes of every day life. The illustrations connected readers intimately with the magazine and Americans would look forward each issue, in large part, for the cover.  The most famous images were created by Norman Rockwell and J.C. Leyendecker with other notable contributors such as N.C. Wyeth, Charles Livingston Bull, John Philip Falter, and John E. Sheridan.

The rise in popularity of television in the 1950’s led to a decline in circulation of the magazine. As well, its optimistic picture of  America was contrary to the changing mood of the times. The Vietnam War, the civil rights struggle, and the cold war, made Rockwell’s depiction of the United States seem unrealistic.

Following a damaging libel suit in 1967, the magazine briefly ceased its circulation. The Saturday Evening Post was revived in 1971 as  a bimonthly publication by the non-profit Benjamin Franklin Literary & Medical Society. The magazine now focuses primarily on public health issues, fitness, healthy lifestyles, as well as general interest articles.

Today, I see so many magazine covers that feature heavily photo-shopped celebrities amidst a sea of “what’s inside” cover lines that usually lead  to an article that is selling one thing or another. These covers are forgettable, perhaps so is the content.

The good news is that there are still magazines that go out of their way to produce covers that tell a story, convey an idea, and feature images that make you think – The New Yorker, New York Magazine, Time, Wired, Esquire, to name a few. It’s our challenge to sift through the thousands out there and find the ones worth reading.  Good luck.

Norman Rockwell - Jester - 1939 New Years's Baby - C Leyendecker

Sources: Saturday Evening Post, American Decades, Journal of Magazine and New Media Research

Album Cover Art: Pink Floyd – Division Bell

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Artwork for CD’s, books, magazines, product packages, etc.  have their basic functions for use in promotional materials and advertisements, and as simple protection for the materials contained inside.

The first 78rpm records in the early 1900’s were sold with plain brown paper or cardboard sleeves and it wasn’t until the late 1930’s that the idea of album art was conceived by Alex Steinweiss of Columbia Records. Within ten years, the idea had caught on and most record companies were distributing albums with unique cover art.

As a teenager, I remember anticipating the release of a new album, not just for the music, but what the cover would look like – the story it would tell. It was a part of our teen culture and was the topic of many late night house parties.

The artwork featured today is from the cover of Pink Floyd’s 1994 Division Bell album. I was never a big Floyd fan, but I love this piece. The cover was designed by renowned graphic designer Storm Thorgerson and at first glance, looks like a painting. It is, in fact, a photograph taken of two sculptures by John Robertson. The sculptures currently make their home in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.

Since the introduction of downloadable, digital music, some artists like Peter Saville say that the importance and popularity of album cover art is dead. Famed cover artist Ioannis believes however, that album imagery is even more important as graphics for touring and merchandising become crucial parts of money-making in the music industry.

While the purpose of creating art for music albums may have shifted, the artistic endeavor persists.  Whatever the reason, the benefits to music and art enthusiasts and designers and artists remains – and that’s a great thing.