Art gallery

We Shared a Bear Suit

Missed Connections, Love, Lost and Found, began as a personal illustration project in the form of a blog. Every day for the past three years I have gleaned the Missed Connections section of Craigslist for the funny, strange, tender, sad and hopeful messages posted by lovelorn strangers, and turned them into drawings. Fifty or so have been gathered in a book, published by Workman in 2011.

The real fellow in “We Shared a Bear Suit” wrote to me after his friend stumbled on the blog and recognized him. He never found his bear-girl, but has since met someone equally delightful.

“In one swoop all my Flowers were torn up by the roots and lay about me—scattered, broken, trampled … ”
From Ivan Turgenev’s novel First Love, for Sheri Gee of The Folio Society. The frame story opens with a brief scene in which three Russian gentlemen propose to amuse themselves by recounting the stories of their first loves. The protagonist, Vladimir, recounts the memory of his very unusual first love when he was 16 years old. In the narrative, Vladimir is very young and knows nothing about love. When he meets Zinaida, a beautiful 21-year-old woman, he is struck with her beauty and grace. She fails to reciprocate Vladimir’s love. The story has a tragic conclusion.

Monte Beauchamp is an award-winning art director and graphic designer whose work has appeared in Graphis, Communication Arts, SPDA, Print, American Illustration, and many editions of the Society of Illustrators Annual of American Illustration. He has received numerous awards and honors, and has served as a juror for American Illustration and the Society of Illustrators.

He is the founder and editor of the graphics/illustration/comics annual BLAB! His books include: The Life and Times of R. Crumb (St. Martin’s Press), Striking Images: Vintage Matchbook Cover Art (Chronicle Books), The Devil in Design (Fantagraphics), New and Used BLAB! (Chronicle Books), and many more.

In addition, he is the founder, editor, and designer of BLAB! PictoNovelettes—a series of storybooks for adults presented in a faux-children’s book format. Titles include: Sheep of Fools by Sue Coe and Judith Brody, Old Jewish Comedians by Drew Friedman, The Magic Bottle by Camille Rose Garcia, and several others.

A lifetime fine artist, Steve Henderson pursued a successful career in illustration before turning to fine art fulltime. His paintings are sold and displayed nationwide through exhibitions, shows, and galleries.

About his art, Steve says: "I look for, and paint, beauty, as a counteracting effect of our media-saturated fascination with ugliness. Yes, the world is a brutal place, but it is also our home. There is peace, serenity, quietude, thoughtfulness, majesty, grace, joy, and hope in this home of ours -- and that is what I paint."

The Hamilton King Award, created by Mrs. Hamilton King in memory of her husband through a bequest, is presented annually for the best illustration of the year by a member of the Society. The selection is made by former recipients of this award and may be won only once.

The Richard Gangel Art Director Award was established in 2005 to honor art directors currently working in the field who have supported and advanced the art of illustration. This award is named in honor of Richard Gangel (1918–2002), the influential art director at Sports Illustrated from 1960 to 1981, whose collaboration with illustrators during that period was exceptional.

Though best known as a painter of incidents on the streets of New York, John Sloan began his career as an illustrator, and the lessons of illustration remained central to his practice. Between 1892 and 1915, illustration was Sloan’s primary means of support, and his illustrations appeared in newspapers, books, and magazines, and on advertising posters. Sloan’s illustration work inflected his paintings and etchings, helping to shape his interests and his technique.

Born in 1871 in Lock Haven, Pennsylvania, Sloan moved to Philadelphia with his family at the age of five. He grew up in a household that prized books, periodicals, and prints, and the earliest evidence of Sloan’s artistic talent comes in the form of drawings added to his 1883 copy of Treasure Island. Using ink, watercolor, and pencil, the young Sloan produced three half-page illustrations, penned tiny images in the table of contents, and even added his name to the title page. Produced when the artist was around age 12, these drawings foreshadowed Sloan’s future vocation.

Sloan’s career as a professional illustrator began while he was still in his teens. As a young man, he was forced to leave the prestigious Central High School to help support his family, and one of his early jobs was at A. E. Newton, where he produced cards, gift books, and other novelties. Many of these items were produced as etchings, a medium he taught himself in the late 1880s. For Newton, Sloan depicted the homes of famous poets, designed pretty calendars, and etched Thoughts from Tennyson. His delicate, precise renderings reveal a flair for decoration, which helped him earn a position on the staff of the Philadelphia Inquirer in 1892.

That year Sloan rented a studio on Chestnut Street with another illustrator, Joe Laub. He also began classes at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and met the painter Robert Henri, who had just returned from study in Paris. Sloan’s diverse interests are apparent in the business card that he produced about that time. On the card, etched with architectural and foliate motifs, Sloan promoted his skills in designing, etching, illustrating, advertising sketches, and lettering. Sloan continued at the Inquirer until he received a better offer from the competing Philadelphia Press. At these newspapers, Sloan produced a wide range of illustrations, including on-the-spot news pictures, though it quickly became apparent that this was not his strength, unlike his friends William Glackens, George Luks, and Everett Shinn who excelled at rapid sketches.

Sloan specialized in decorative work, like headings, puzzles, and illustrations for fiction and the society pages. He studied French and English illustrators, including Daumier, Gavarni, Leech, and Du Maurier. He developed an elegant personal style, using flat patterns and sinuous lines that drew on French art nouveau and Japanese woodblock prints. Sloan was part of the emerging aesthetic of the poster style. His stylized illustrations began to appear in advertisements and little magazines, like Moods and The Echo, and on book covers, as well as in the Philadelphia papers. With Shinn, Sloan attempted to launch a magazine named and patterned after the French Gil Blas, with illustrations by his expanding circle of friends. These little magazines were very short-lived, but at the end of the decade Sloan’s elegant illustrations began to appear in books and mainstream magazines. By that time, his presence was strong at the Press where he produced puzzles for the Sunday supplement. In 1900, his puzzles became full-page color features that invited readers to send their solutions to the newspaper for a ten-dollar prize.

Around that time, under the influence of Henri, Sloan was beginning to paint more seriously, producing portraits and scenes of life in his Philadelphia neighborhood. His work for the Press was supplemented with a major commission to etch illustrations for a luxurious edition of the works of the French author, Charles Paul de Kock, published by Frederick J. Quinby Co. of Boston. In all, Sloan produced 53 etchings for the series. His images include humorous character studies and groups of figures interacting in the streets, gardens, and drawing rooms of mid-nineteenth-century Paris. The De Kock commission honed Sloan’s abilities as an etcher and earned him praise as an illustrator.

His reputation as an illustrator and his mastery of etching served him well when he moved to New York in 1904. His New York City Life set—a series of etchings featuring humorous glimpses of the streets and apartments of Sloan’s neighborhood—benefitted from the lessons learned producing the De Kock project. The City Life etchings, which were not illustrations, vividly conveyed the character of the city’s neighborhoods and residents through composition, pose, and expression.In moving to New York, Sloan followed several Philadelphia friends. Around the turn of the century, Henri, Shinn, Glackens, and George Luks had all relocated to New York, which had become the national center of art and publishing. As newspapers moved toward the use of more photographs, Sloan and his illustrator friends were forced to shift their


Halloween Puzzle. For The Philadelphia Press, October 27, 1901. Watercolor, pen and ink, graphite on paper board.

In moving to New York, Sloan followed several Philadelphia friends. Around the turn of the century, Henri, Shinn, Glackens, and George Luks had all relocated to New York, which had become the national center of art and publishing. As newspapers moved toward the use of more photographs, Sloan and his illustrator friends were forced to shift their focus toward magazines and books. Newspaper puzzles and cartoons remained sources of income for Sloan and Luks, but Sloan also sought commissions from Century, Collier’s, and McClure’s. His adoptive city provided the setting for some of Sloan’s most accomplished magazine illustrations, like his pictures for “The Steady” from 1905. In addition, he and his friends became increasingly interested in painting the people and places they encountered in New York.

Finding their city paintings frequently rejected from juried exhibitions, the group of friends, headed by Henri, began to organize alternative exhibitions. In 1908, Sloan, Henri, Shinn, Glackens, and Luks received an enormous amount of press attention when they exhibited together—with three other friends, Arthur B. Davies, Ernest Lawson, and Maurice Prendergast—at Macbeth Galleries. Portrayed as a protest against the conservatism of the National Academy of Design, the show was a huge success attracting publicity, visitors, and sales. The group became known as the Eight and the exhibition toured around the country. None of Sloan’s work sold, however, and he supported himself that year, in part, by illustrating Ralph Bergengren’s humorous pirate tales in Collier’s in a clever woodcut style. His style was popular with the author, and the stories were popular with the public. Sloan continued to illustrate Bergengren’s pirate tales for five more years, even as he became increasingly engaged with Socialist politics.

Author and artist Edward St. John Gorey was a child prodigy, drawing pictures at the age of two, and reading (self-taught) by the time he was three. Excelling at school, he skipped some early grades and arrived at Chicago’s legendary Francis Parker School in the ninth grade. An exceptional student, he contributed to many school events, exhibited in the annual art shows, and appeared in various school publications. When he was 13, a Chicago newspaper published his cartoons in its sports pages—Gorey’s first commercial work.

Having received the highest regional scores on his college boards, Gorey was offered scholarships to Harvard and other academic institutions. After graduating from Francis Parker when he was 17, with pending draft notices, Gorey postponed university and enrolled in art courses at the Art Institute of Chicago. He then entered the U.S. Army and served during World War II from 1943 until after the end of the war.

In 1946 he enrolled at Harvard, where he occasionally made the Dean’s List. He began pursuing artistic interests: publishing stories, poems, and illustrations in student publications; and designing sets, directing, and writing for the influential Poets Theatre (with John Ashbery, Frank O’Hara, Alison Lurie, Violet Lang, and others). His illustrations appeared for the first time in a published book in 1950. Two years later he was offered a position in the art department of Doubleday Publishers in New York City. He became a serious admirer and frequent attendee of George Balanchine’s New York City Ballet and would later often refer to Balanchine as a major influence on his work.

Gorey rapidly became a significant figure in the Doubleday art department. In 1953 he published his first book, The Unstrung Harp, an illustrated 64-page novella about the creative struggles of a novelist. The book stands today as one of the early precursors to the graphic novel movement in which both text and illustration tell the story. Graham Greene declared The Unstrung Harp “the best novel ever written about a novelist, and I ought to know!” The London Times referred to it as “a minor masterpiece.” Writing in The New Yorker, America’s pre-eminent literary critic Edmund Wilson gave Gorey his first early critical boost. Gorey’s 50 years of exceptional productivity had begun.

Gorey had established an association with New York City’s Gotham Book Mart in the early 1940s while still in the Army. As a voracious reader he began accumulating a unique library of some 25,000 books, many of which he had read more than once. When he came to the city to work he began making frequent visits to the bookshop and became a close friend of its founder, Frances Steloff. In 1961 he launched The Fantod Press, his own private press imprint and sold many of his copies through the Gotham Book Mart.

As early as 1939 Gorey had begun exhibiting his art work at the Francis Parker School, and continued to exhibit during his Harvard years at the Mandrake Bookshop, and as far away as California. In December of 1967, Gotham Book Mart announced the opening of a second-floor art gallery in its brownstone and invited Gorey to be among its first newspaper published his cartoons in its sports pages—Gorey’s first commercial work.

Having received the highest regional scores on his college boards, Gorey was offered scholarships to Harvard and other academic institutions. After graduating from Francis Parker when he was 17, with pending draft notices, Gorey postponed university and enrolled in art courses at the Art Institute of Chicago. He then entered the U.S. Army and served during World War II from 1943 until after the end of the war.

In 1946 he enrolled at Harvard, where he occasionally made the Dean’s List. He began pursuing artistic interests: publishing stories, poems, and illustrations in student publications; and designing sets, directing, and writing for the influential Poets Theatre (with John Ashbery, Frank O’Hara, Alison Lurie, Violet Lang, and others). His illustrations appeared for the first time in a published book in 1950. Two years later he was offered a position in the art department of Doubleday Publishers in New York City. He became a serious admirer and frequent attendee of George Balanchine’s New York City Ballet and would later often refer to Balanchine as a major influence on his work.

Gorey rapidly became a significant figure in the Doubleday art department. In 1953 he published his first book, The Unstrung Harp, an illustrated 64-page novella about the creative struggles of a novelist. The book stands today as one of the early precursors to the graphic novel movement in which both text and illustration tell the story. Graham Greene declared The Unstrung Harp “the best novel ever written about a novelist, and I ought to know!” The London Times referred to it as “a minor masterpiece.” Writing in The New Yorker, America’s pre-eminent literary critic Edmund Wilson gave Gorey his first early critical boost. Gorey’s 50 years of exceptional productivity had begun.

Gorey had established an association with New York City’s Gotham Book Mart in the early 1940s while still in the Army. As a voracious reader he began accumulating a unique library of some 25,000 books, many of which he had read more than once. When he came to the city to work he began making frequent visits to the bookshop and became a close friend of its founder, Frances Steloff. In 1961 he launched The Fantod Press, his own private press imprint and sold many of his copies through the Gotham Book Mart.

As early as 1939 Gorey had begun exhibiting his art work at the Francis Parker School, and continued to exhibit during his Harvard years at the Mandrake Bookshop, and as far away as California. In December of 1967, Gotham Book Mart announced the opening of a second-floor art gallery in its brownstone and invited Gorey to be among its first exhibitors. He exhibited there for the next 32 years, until his death. As a result of this association, Gotham Book Mart began to occasionally publish new Gorey works and eventually arranged for Gorey illustrations to appear in works by Samuel Beckett, John Updike, and others.

The theater had always interested Gorey and he was soon involved in off-Broadway productions. Eventually, his own experimental plays were produced on Cape Cod in the summertime, using local amateur actors and even puppets, to the delight and puzzlement of the local community. In 1973 Gorey designed a production of Dracula for a small theater on Nantucket Island. It attracted considerable interest, and in 1977 opened on Broadway as Edward Gorey’s Dracula. A huge commercial success with extraordinary reviews, it garnered two Tony Awards for Best Revival and Best Costumes, ran for almost three years, and had road companies across America, in London, Australia, and elsewhere.

Gorey’s work received serious critical reviews and high praise; his books have been translated into 15 foreign languages (beginning in 1961 with his Swiss German publisher Diogenes Verlag). In 1972 he published his first anthology, Amphigorey, containing 15 of his early works. The New York Times selected it as “One of the Five Noteworthy Art Books of 1972.” Three more anthologies followed (Amphigorey Too, Amphigorey Also, and Amphigorey Again), and have now become Gorey classics and the cornerstones of his large body of work. His strong interest in book design eventually expanded into various forms, including miniatures, pop-up books, books with movable parts, and other unusual formats. Over 150 book designs and hundreds of periodical illustrations are listed in his bibliography and are now much sought after by Gorey enthusiasts.