Six Artists Illustrate Cormac McCarthy’s “Blood Meridan”

The latest project from artist Zak Smith is a collaboration with several other artists: Sean McCarthy, John Mejias, Craig Taylor, Shawn Cheng, and Matt Wiegle. “Six Versions of Blood Meridian” offers illustrations of Cormac McCarthy’s novel Blood Meridian. The story follows a teen runaway as he travels across the American West during the mid 1800′s and rides with some of the most colorfully depraved fictional characters ever put to paper.

The work is ongoing, and so far offers a couple dozen pages in several styles with a corresponding passage from McCarthy’s book below each image.

Page 82, “When all the chambers were loaded she capped them and looked about… A group of fowl in the corner of the courtyard that had been pecking in dry dust stood nervously, their heads at varied angles.” Illustration by Zak Smith

To see more of this ongoing project click here

posted by: Brent Carter

Website Shout Out: BibliOdyssey

From Histoire de Perlette by illustrator Béatrice Appia

Books aren’t usually the first medium that comes to mind when art is concerned – but take a look at BibliOdyssey and be prepared to be blown away.  Every entry features a piece of book art and (usually) an explanation about the art, the book it was originally published in, and other deliciously nerdy facts. Warning – between the pictures and the accompanying blurbs, you’ll be in BibliOdyssey land for hours and hours. It’s a day-killer, and it’s massive with tons of archives.  Also included are links to source material where available, which when clicked can open up a whole other treasure trove of rare, beautiful, and incredible images.   A must for anybody who loves books for more than the words,  is looking for a new place to find some amazing book art created from thousands of years ago to yesterday.

From Galvanizing Albini: Among the inspirations for Mary Shelley’s gothic classic ‘Frankenstein’ from 1818 were the (in)famous experiments carried out in public by the physicist Giovanni Aldini (1762-1834) at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1803.

From Nuclear Reactor Wall Charts: Snupps (Standardized Nuclear Unit Power Plant System): Kansas City Power & Light Co., Burlington, Kansas. Wall chart insert, Nuclear Engineering International, November 1975

See more here

posted by: Meghan Bainum

RIP: Caricaturist and Illustrator David Levine

David Levine created thousands of satirical portraits for The New York Review of Books and other publications. He died Tuesday at New York Presbyterian Hospital in Manhattan of prostate cancer and complications from other ailments. He was 83.

According to his New York Times obit, Levine’s work was “not only witty but serious, not only biting but deeply informed, and artful in a painterly sense as well as a literate one.” It goes on to call him “the heir of the 19th-century masters of the illustration, Honoré Daumier and Thomas Nast.”

Check out the New York Review of Books‘ archive of Levine’s work that dates all the way back to 1963 here

Listen to NPR’s coverage of Levine and his work here

posted by: Brent Carter

Guitar Lessons Ilustration by Maxim Dalton

Buenos Aires-based illustrator Maxim Dalton created this great piece which includes, “all my rock guitar heroes of all time and some other that I don’t like that much but I thought they deserve at least to appear on the list.”

Featuring: Frank Zappa, George Harrison, Slash, Jimi Hendrix, Keith Richards, Jimmy Page, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler, Brian May, Johnny Ramone, Jack White, The Edge, Chuck Berry, Angus Young, Pete Townshend, Tony Iommi, Eddie Van Halen, David Gilmour, Ace Frehley, Ritchie Blackmore, Duane Allman, Kirk Hammett, Carlos Santana, John Frusciante, Yngwie Malmsteen, Kurt Cobain, Mike Bloomfield, Jerry Garcia, Ry Cooder, Bo Diddley, Jeff Beck, Tom Morello, Brian Setzer and Peter Green.

It will be available as a print very soon, more info here

posted by: Harold Johns III

R. Crumb Illustrates The Book of Genesis

“The Hammer Museum (10899 Wilshire Blvd in Los Angeles) presents seminal comic artist R. Crumb’s adaptation of the first book of the Old Testament, the Book of Genesis. Crumb has spent the last five years on this incredibly ambitious endeavor. The exhibition features 207 individual, black and white drawings incorporating every word from all fifty chapters, as well as a cover, title page, introduction and back cover. Each drawing contains six to eight comic panels illustrating the stories of Adam and Eve, Noah’s Ark, Sodom and Gomorrah, and more. Using his signature bawdy style, Crumb’s version of the Book of Genesis puts an entirely new twist on the Bible.

“Born in Philadelphia in 1943, Crumb began drawing comics as a young boy, influenced by his older brother Charles. In the early 1960s he drew cards for the American Greetings Corporation and in the late 1960s he traveled to New York, Chicago, and Detroit and created many of his rambunctious and unforgettable characters including Mr. Natural, Mr. Snoid and Angelfood McSpade. In 1967, he moved to San Francisco and later that year he drew Zap #1 and Zap #0 and sold them on the street, which marked the beginning of his role as one of the founding fathers of the underground comic movement. In the last months of 1969, Crumb received a $10,000 advance from Ballantine Books for a Fritz the Cat book, but he later killed the character, dissatisfied for its portrayal on film. Crumb’s Mr. Natural strip ran in The Village Voice for about a year (later compiled as Mr. Natural #3), and in 1981, he produced and edited a new comic magazine called Weirdo which included the work of other artists. By the end of the 1980s, Crumb and his wife, Aline, relocated to the south of France, where they live and work today” (Hammer Museum).

The Bible Illuminated: R. Crumb’s Book of Genesis will be on view through February 7, 2010.

You can also buy a copy of The Book of Genesis Illustrated by R. Crumb, with a handwritten introduction by the artist, edited by Robert Weil, and published by W.W. Norton. The hardcover catalogue is 224 pages and was released October 19, 2009.

For an entertaining cinematic portrait of this controversial and very distinctive artist we suggest the 1994 documentary entitled Crumb.

posted by: Harold Johns III