Next Week’s New Yorker Cover
We haven’t seen an early released New Yorker cover for some time (they usually don’t appear until Monday morning). Here’s Eric Drooker’s for next week’s issue. Read more here.
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Article Of Interest: Liana Finck
From The Comics Journal, May 26, 2022: “Liana Finck’s Skeptical Mythologizing” by Andrew Field.
Ms.Finck began contributing to The New Yorker in 2013.
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Video Of Interest: Yasin Osman
From The Kilgore News Herald, May 26, 2022, “Cartoonist says he developed a sense of humor in response to bullying”
— this short video on Mr. Osman, who began contributing to The New Yorker in March of 2021.
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Pod Guest Of Interest: Bob Staake On The Cartoon Contest Podcast
New Yorker cover artist, Bob Staake (lower left above) joins the CCCP’s hosts (from upper left and going clockwise), Paul Nesja, Beth Lawler, and Vin Coca. Listen here.
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Editor’s Note
An interesting interview with Mr. Staake. One part of it (at the 1:22:41 mark) caused some reflection here at the Spill:
Vin Coca: Many if not most of the cartoonists we have on have aspirations to go to the cover side, so…
Bob Staake: Well of course they do. Of course they do. And the thing is, they are totally different worlds. They are completely different worlds. And to be completely honest I’m sometimes resentful when I see a New Yorker — what we would call a gag cartoonist — on the cover because, completely different world. A cover is about design, a cover is about metaphor, a cover is about — it’s not, it’s not, you know it’s not a one liner type composition, you know, so I always …George Booth and I love each other like crazy, but the thing is there’s a lot of times I think that, you know, George is not right for that cover, you know…
I gave some thought to what Mr. Staake said. If you define “worlds” as departments within the New Yorker, one can’t disagree that the cartoon world and the cover world are totally different now. It has been that way at the magazine since 1992, when Tina Brown decreed that cartoonists would have their own editor and cover artists would have their own editor. Pre-Ms. Brown’s reign, cartoons and covers were under the care of a single editor, the art editor. Following the split of one department into two, cartoonists work seldom appeared on the cover.
As time goes by, I do think it’s important to remember this: that for 68 years, from 1925 until the Fall of 1992 when Ms. Brown took the reins as The New Yorker‘s editor, it was The New Yorker’s cartoonists who contributed the lion’s share of the cover art. The “worlds” were, for most of the magazine’s history, not “totally different” — in fact, if my count is correct, for those 68 years (1925-1992) the cartoonists contributed 60% of the magazine’s covers. We know by their work, by their art — much of it incredibly stunning — that they knew what a cover was (I have no doubt that present day New Yorker cartoonists also know what a cover is).
These are the cartoonists who created covers in those years:
Charles Addams
Alajalov
Alain
Peter Arno
Niculae Asciu
Perry Barlow
Charles Barsotti
Ralph Barton
Abe Birnbaum
R.O. Blechman
Victor Bobritsky
George Booth
E. Simms Campbell
Roz Chast
Whitney Darrow, Jr.
James Daugherty
Robert Day
Abner Dean
Richard Decker
Julian de Miskey
Andre De Schaub
Leonard Dove
Alan Dunn
Joseph Farris
Douglas Florian
Al Frueh
William Crawford Galbraith
Arthur Getz
Alice Harvey
Helen Hokinson
Stan Hunt
Rea Irvin
Edward Koren
Anatol Kovarsky
Robert Kraus
Arnie Levin
Lee Lorenz
Kenneth Mahood
Robert Mankoff
Reginald Marsh
Charles E. Martin
Warren Miller
Frank Modell
Lou Myers
John Norment
John O’Brien
Mary Petty
Garrett Price
George Price
Gardner Rea
Donald Reilly
Mischa Richter
Victoria Roberts
Charles Saxon
Ronald Searle
J.J. Sempe
Barbara Shermund
William Steig
Saul Steinberg
James Stevenson
Anthony Taber
Richard Taylor
James Thurber
Barney Tobey
Dean Vietor
Robert Weber
Jack Ziegler
To see the work by these cartoonist cover artists find a copy of the book The Complete Book OF Covers From The New Yorker 1925-1989. If you subscribe to the magazine you have access (through its website) to every issue of the magazine.
I agree, cartoonists have done so many amazing covers over the years, and I should have jumped in and said so, but the conversation moved on before I got to do so, to my regret. I especially love Peter Arno and George Booth covers. I actually have a framed Booth cover hanging in my son’s room, that’s how much I love it. And don’t forget Bruce Eric Kaplan (he had three in 2017!) and Victoria Roberts! They also have published covers that are fantastic. I am glad you pointed this out.
This exchange starts at 1:06:11.
Thanks, Beth. Yes, a small number of cartoonist cover artists since 1992 (including, as you note, Bruce Kaplan). The list focuses on the pre-Tina Brown years. Victoria should be on the list. Good catch!