Monday Tilley Watch, The New Yorker Issue Of June 9, 2025; Tom Toro Now On Substack

The Monday Tilley Watch takes a glancing look at the art and artists of the latest issue of The New Yorker

The Cartoonists and Cartoons:

Sixteen cartoons, sixteen cartoonists. One duo, that we know of, and one newbie: Enrico Pinto, who is the 5th cartoonist added to the magazine’s colosseum of cartoonists this year, and the 170th brought in since Emma Allen took the cartoon editor reins in May of 2017. The longest active contributing cartoonist in the issue is John O’Brien, whose first New Yorker cartoon appeared in the issue of August 3, 1987.

This week’s cartoons (viewed in a slideshow).

The Cartoon Caption Contest (and the cartoonist providing the drawing).

The Rea Irvin Talk Watch:

Rea Irvin’s above perfect 92 year old Talk design was nixed in the Spring of 2017 and replaced by –gasp!– a redrawn version by a contemporary illustrator. The Spill continues to hope Mr. Irvin’s work returns. Read more here.

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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): 179. Number of cartoons contributed: 261.

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Tom Toro Now On Substack

Tom Toro, who began contributing to The New Yorker in 2010, debuts “Undiscovered Masterpieces” on Substack today.

Tom told the Spill:

“Just a small percentage of my cartoons are meant for The New Yorker. The bulk of them are too absurd, too macabre, too controversial, drawn from some deep impulse that I dare not investigate, and they’ll never see the light of day—until now! Each week, I will bring you three undiscovered masterpieces; the weird, the wild, the wonderfully silly. You can’t find these cartoons anywhere else.”

More TT: Link here to the Tom Toro website.