The Monday Tilley Watch takes a glancing look at the art and artists of the latest issue of The New Yorker
The Cover: Library Lion
The Cartoonists and Cartoons:
Fourteen cartoons, fourteen cartoonists. No newbies. No duos, that we know of. The longest active cartoonist in this issue is Roz Chast, who began contributing in July of 1978.
See the issue’s cartoons here.
The Cartoon Caption Contest Cartoonists: Liza Donnelly, Will McPhail, Sam Marlow. See the caption contest cartoons here.
The Rea Irvin Talk Watch:
Why are you seeing Rea Irvin’s Talk Of The Town design below? Because you won’t see it in the latest issue of The New Yorker, and you haven’t seen it since May of 2017. Back then it was replaced by — if you can believe it — a redrawn version (a version not drawn by Mr. Irvin’s hand). Read more here. The Spill continues to hope Mr. Irvin’s design is brought back.
Rea Irvin’s A-Z Entry:
Rea Irvin (pictured above. Self portrait above from Meet the Artist) *Born, San Francisco, 1881; died in the Virgin Islands,1972. Irvin was the cover artist for the New Yorker’s first issue, February 21, 1925. He was the magazine’s first art and only art supervisor (some refer to him as its first art editor) holding the position from 1925 until 1939 when James Geraghty assumed the title of art editor. Irvin then became art director and remained in that position until William Shawn officially succeeded Harold Ross in early 1952. Irvin’s last original work for the magazine was the magazine’s cover of July 12, 1958. The February 21, 1925 Eustace Tilley cover had been reproduced every year on the magazine’s anniversary until 1994, when R. Crumb’s Tilley-inspired cover appeared. Tilley has since reappeared, with other artists substituting from time-to-time. Number of New Yorker covers (not including the repeat appearances of the first cover every anniversary up to 1991): 163. Number of cartoons contributed: 261.