Happy 95th, R.O. Blechman!
The Spill wishes the terrif New Yorker cover artist, R.O. Blechman a very happy 95th birthday.
Mr. Blechman’s A-Z Entry:
R.O. Blechman (photo: Hillsdale, NY, 2017. photo by Elwood Smith ). Born, New York, October1, 1930. New Yorker work: Mr. Blechman is, among many other editorial and commercial pursuits, a cover artist for The New Yorker, with his first appearing on the issue of April 29, 1974. His last cover, titled “Eustacia Tilley” appeared on the magazine’s anniversary issue of February 26, 1996. It was inspired by the magazine’s inaugural issue featuring Eustace Tilley.
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First and Last: Mary Gibson
First and Last is an Ink Spill series that takes a look at an artist’s first published New Yorker drawing and their last.
Mary Gibson is a New Yorker contributor who has mostly slipped through the cracks over time. For quite some time I knew almost nothing about her* except that she was published eight times in The New Yorker between 1943 and 1950. Of those eight appearance, six were in 1943, within three months (July, August, and September). There were no other appearances until 1950 when two appeared. One was in March and then her last in April.
Here’s Mary Gibson’s first New Yorker drawing, published in the issue of June 26, 1943:
And here’s her last, published April 29, 1950:
*Thanks to Larry Lariar’s Best Cartoons of 1947 , we have this self portrait by Ms. Gibson, and this piece she wrote about herself:
And…thanks to Mike Lynch, and. Stephen Nadler of Attempted Bloggery, we have more information.
Mr. Lynch mentioned having heard from Ms. Gibson’s son, back in 2012, that he was archiving his mother’s work. Wonder if there’s an update to that effort.
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Event Of Interest: Ann Arbor Comic Arts Festival
From the festival’s website, news that Julia Wertz, who began contributing to The New Yorker in 2015 will be among the headliners, October 11, 2025. Also headlining: Caroline Cash, who has contributed online to the magazine.