The Monday Tilley Watch Takes A Glancing Look At The Art & Artists Of The Latest Issue Of The New Yorker
The Cover: A doggie in the window cover, via artist Diana Ejaita. Read a short Q&A with her here.
I’m not sure why, exactly, but this later cover made me think of another cover, from long long ago, by the king of New Yorker covers, Arthur Getz.* Mr. Getz’s theme, in his cover of March 9, 1968, is not related to Ms. Ejaita’s. It’s the geometry in the design of both, and the color palette that made my mind time travel. Notice how the table in the forefront of Ms. Ejaita’s cover is nearly, but not entirely identical to the shape front and center in Mr. Getz’s. And then there are the strong dark verticals in both. All of this noticing doesn’t mean a whole lot, but it did afford me the opportunity to re-read Brendan Gil’s Peter Arno obit, which is found in the Getz cover issue.
The Cartoonists:
Twelve cartoons, thirteen cartoonists. Relative newbie, Millie von Platen contributes the issue’s Spots (her first drawing appeared in the issue of September 24, 2020).
The Spill counts duos as one cartoonist; if it didn’t, there’d be sixteen cartoonists in this issue.
I’m not sure if this is a record — If it isn’t a record, it’s a tie for the record — but it sure feels like one: the record for most publicly acknowledged cartoonist duos in an issue of The New Yorker (we never know, and will never know how many behind the scenes duos are in play in any given issue). Weedsy, I know, but we do get weedsy at times here on the Spill.
No newbies in the issue but there is a drawing by the late great Jack Ziegler,* who passed away nearly four years ago.
The Cartoons:
Three drawings caught my eye this week, including Karl Stevens’s philosophical dandelion seed heads (it’s on page 43). Also Luke Kruger-Howard’s walnut night drawing (p.64). And then there’s Lars Kenseth’s doggie with a weapon (p.73).
The Rea Irvin Talk Masthead Watch:
The above design by the great Rea Irvin (he gave us Eustace Tilley, among so many other things), a thing of beauty, was shelved in the Spring of 2017, and replaced by a redraw (gasp!). Read all about it here.
*Arthur Getz’s entry on the Spills A-Z:
Arthur Getz Born, Passaic, New Jersey, 1913; died, 1996. NYer work: 1938 -1988. Primarily a cover artist, he had one cartoon published: March 15, 1958. (You might say his career was a mirror image of George Price’s, who was one of the most prolific cartoonists, with over 1200 published, and one cover). According to the official Getz website, he was the most prolific of all New Yorker cover artists, having 213 appear during the fifty years he contributed to the magazine. The official Getz website, containing his biography: www.getzart.com/
**Jack Ziegler’s entry on the Spill’s A-Z:
Jack Ziegler (photo above, by Michael Maslin, taken at The Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art, NYC, 2008) Born, Brooklyn, NY July 13, 1942. Died, March 29, 2017. New Yorker work: 1974 – 2017. Key collections: all of Ziegler’s collections are must-haves. Here’re some favorites: Hamburger Madness (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1978), Filthy Little Things ( Doubleday/Dolphin, 1981) and The Essential Jack Ziegler, Complied and Edited by Lee Lorenz ( Workman, 2000). Link here for Ink Spill’s Jack Ziegler interview from late 2016.