Can you create a New Yorker cover with nothing more than six black lines, two additional colors and a masthead in yellow? More importantly, can you do ALL of that in a final piece of art that takes you, what, 43 seconds to complete? Apparently the answer is yes -- and yes.



The word went out to the artists around Thanksgiving that we should think December holiday -- hopefully upbeat stuff -- so I started thinking in the direction I always go at times like that; get decorative.  I tried a few ideas but then starting wondering if I could represent the "reduced" or "minimalized" holiday that all of us -- businesses and consumers -- will be experiencing this year. With any luck the lowered holiday expectations will have a unifying effect and bring us all together



Metaphorically, no artist better sums up the concept of minimalism better than Piet Mondrian, and while his canvases are traditionally starkly white with black, red, blue and yellow lines and squares, I thought I could pull off an allusion to his work by primarily using red and green on white.



I originally titled the piece 'Minimalistmas', then changed it to 'Seasonal Pattern' then ultimately we went with 'Minimalist Christmas'. What compounds the importance of not being too direct or specific with the concept behind the art is that this cover will be on newsstands for two long weeks. If it can have a shelf life of two weeks as a visually pleasing image and still have some subtle (and hopefully) poetic concept resting behind it for just as long, then the cover is a success. But it does come from my heart -- because if anyone knows me like my family knows me, they're the ones pushing for the eight foot tall Christmas tree and I'm the guy who says "let's clip some birch branches, put them in a green bauer vase and hang three or four ornaments!"



This year, I might finally get the Minimalist Christmas I'VE always wanted.



Simple, basic, real -- just the way it's supposed to be.

By using cut paper to create a myriad of cars, I'll insure that their shapes and colors will for at the forefront of the books' design. The kids, adults and pets will be done the same way, though they will be slightly more detailed and certainly more visually diverse than what if exhibited here in this greeked design test and sample cover.

These days when it comes to picture books, I tend to concentrate on writing and illustrating my own stuff. In the past I've estimated that for every book I publish, I've probably written another 8 or 10 stories that never saw it to print. There can be many reasons for this -- the story just wasn't working right, it didn't have a "poeticness" that I look for, the illustrations started to bore me, I came up with a much better idea, I told my editor about the book idea and she said "Bob, have you been huffing fixative again?", etc. At the end of the day, life is short -- and I've got plenty of books I want to get to before I start drooling excessively and wearing my pants hiked up to my nipples. A week doesn't go by that a writer will send me a flattering email, butter me up real good, then drop the bomb; "I've written this picture book and my dream is that you'll like it and want to illustrate the story." 99 out of 100 times the story is lame at best -- maybe some glimmer of hope in the first sentence, but at the fourth or fifth things start going downhill -- usually when a grandpa character enters the story and starts talking about his childhood dog that was killed in a train mishap -- either that or he starts ranting about Communism. Peter Stein is a former writer at Hallmark Cards and remembered the work I used to do for them as a freelancer way back in the go-go 1990s. He wrote a story called Cars Galore! and asked if I could read it. I not only read it and loved it, but emailed him back 15 minutes later saying I thought the book was delightful and wanted to take it on. He was ecstatic -- but I had to caution him not to get his hopes up too high because sometimes I can be a pain to work with. I sent along his manuscript to my agent, the fabulous and talented Gillian, and said I wanted to do the book with Peter. She too loved it -- so onward we push. The first stage is always getting a sense of where to go with the cover -- and here I wanted to try something a little different. I see all the weird, wild and wonderful cars detailed in the rhythmic rhyming story simply driving left to right against a white background for each spread. This will give me the opportunity to let the crazy form of each car shine in center stage, its vibrant colors screaming against that spartan backdrop. To achieve this, I'm cutting the car forms from ordinary bond paper, scanning them and then adding color and some details, but leaning toward the more graphic spectrum of things rather than the filly-saturated world I'm known for. The people -- drivers, kids, pets, etc -- they'll all be done essentially the same way, though I have only greeked them into this sample cover, but together everything is close to what I envisioned when I first read Peter's manuscript; clean, retro-inspired and graphic.

I've been at this thing called illustration for well over 30 years and in that time I've been fortunate enough to have my fair share of successes in animation, books, magazines, newspapers, greeting cards, advertising and even (shudder!) cereal boxes.

When I look back, I've somehow been able to support my family of four by doing nothing other than create art that's sometimes supposed to make you smile, other times make you think, still other times make you dream. Silly, isn't it?

But in this 30+ year career I have never received more phone calls, emails and letters than for a simple New Yorker cover entitled Reflection. This morning I learned that TIME named mine #1 on their list of Top Ten Magazine Covers of 2008.

Needless to say, I'm extremely honored -- and flattered to read what Arthur Hochstein, long a design idol of me and many others, had to say about my image. What pleases me even more -- and should please Drawgers as well -- is that at a time when more and more magazines seem to prefer photography over illustration, THIS is an illustration. Françoise Mouly, David Remnick and the rest of the editorial and design staff at The New Yorker deserve kudos for the honor as well.



Check out ALL the covers honored here -- some amazing pieces!

TIME's Top Ten Magazine Covers of 2008

Needless to say, it's as much an honor to see my Obama victory 'New Yorker' cover on newsstands as it is humbling.

On the night of Obama's win, I sketched a number of potential approaches, but with this one entitled 'Reflection', I think I just got lucky.

Still, I sure feel fortunate to be part of this historically-significant event in one small way with an understated, quiet and hopefully reflective piece of art.

 

When I was a kid (and that was a long time ago), I was a voracious reader -- but more importantly, perhaps, I was a constant "looker". It didn't matter what the magazine was -- if it was laying around, I was leafing through it -- looking at the pretty pictures, studying the typefaces, drinking up the photos, wondering how these artists all created these amazing illustrations. In those days, magazines seemed to be FILLED with illustrations -- full page ones, half page ones, and these smaller, inconsequential images that I later discovered were called "spots". What dawned on me back in the mid-1960s was that while all these magazines each had a single cover, they had many, many more spot illustrations inside. It was then that I set a goal for myself; to be known as the KING of the spot illustration. Okay, so all plans go a little awry -- animation design comes along, you do a few children's books, and with any luck, you get a few covers in there -- and all those things cut into your goal as the world's preeminent self-employed purveyor of all things spotty. But I digress (gee, THERE'S comething new) -- the point is, I still LOVE spots! I absolutely, completely and thoroughly LOVE spots! Anytime a client says "hey, Schlomo -- got time to hit me with a spot?", man, I am ON it! They're quick, they're pressure-free, and they're always an opportunity to just kick back, blast the iTunes and draw. I saw this one in my head so didn't bother with a sketch -- a line in the story "alligator blood as a kind of gator-ade" was enough to suggest croco-vampire. An hour later, I'm finished, the 3" x 4" piece is emailed to the client (Boy's Life) -- and they like it so much that they respond back asking me if I have time for ANOTHER spot.

Bring it on, baby -- bring it ON!

First J.D. posted a recent assignment for the lovely and talented Soojin Buzelli, then Scott Bakal jumped in, so now I might as well also. This was the cover. The main thesis of the story was "lifting up standards" -- and for some reason i thought of a train to represent the traditional business model, but then levitate it over the track to demonstrate "lifting up". It was a stretch, but apparently Soojin was able to sell her editor on it. The main thing I wanted here was a very simple image, so I gave her four potentila facial expressiions on the Henry Dreyfuss-esque streamline moderne locomotive and then went to finish.

A video of me creating this week's cover of the Politics 2008 issue of The New Yorker debuted on BoingBoing.net on Monday -- and when it did, the short 1:39 minute film began hitting blog after blog (some well-known, some obscure) like popcorn.

I'm always surprised when that happens, because this is really nothing more than a decorative piece and by NO means a right-between-the-turbaned-eyes-cover by Barry (only 438 to catch up with you, Blitt). Still, the blogs all seem to convey a single common denominator; that I must be a raving psychotic for seeing images like this in my head sans rough sketches and then expressing them on a stark white tiff file by introducing ovals, rectangles and color blocks and then refining them until something recognizable starts to develop.

Ah, what the hell ya gonna do?

Anyway, it was a fun piece to create - hope you enjoy.

BTW, a tip of the hat to Goldin, Flaherty and Kroninger who came to the Cape to record the Sousa soundtrack. That's Goldin on the trumpet, Kroninger on the cymbals and, of course, the stellar fife solo by Flaherty.

Jaunty!

Watch It Here

The Presidential Debate LINGO cards proved quite popular so it only seemed natural (and almost embarassingly easy) to come up with a set for the VICE Presidential debate.

I'm guessing the word "Couric" comes up within the first 5 minutes -- but only after Biden works in "moose", and when Palin says "Todd" in that weird, twangy, nails-on-chalkboard voice of hers, YOU shout "LINGO!"

My hunch is that the debate may produce its share of cringe-worthy moments -- so might as well turn the whole thing into a ridiculous game.

Download 4 game cards here

ps: I'd like to go on the record saying that is Biden, Palin OR moderator Gwen Ifill says "professor nimbus", I will promptly transfer $1000 into Michael Sloan's PayPal account.

Let's face it -- presidential debates can get a little boring. Well, not any more. Download and print these EIGHT different LINGO cards and watch the televised debate. When a candidate utters a buzzword or phrase -- from trillion to golden parachute, solar to drill -- cross it off. First player to get five in a row wins!

Download Your LINGO Game Cards Here