Illustration

Steven Heller|Essays

Draw Me Schools Of Commercial Art

Long before isms, ologies and otics. Before the Chicago Bauhaus, Yale, RISD, Cranbrook and Cal Arts. Before commercial art was called visual communications, the correspondence school was the principal American academy of art and an early …

Steven Heller|Essays

In Praise of the Anthropomorphic

"Disarmament Conference", illustration by Fritz Eichenberg, 1977  I’ve been asked by many students lately, “what is the future of illustration”? I usually refuse to answer on the grounds that I may incriminate myself by …

Steven Heller|Reviews

Breakdowns: A Review

Cover of Art Spiegelman's new book BreakdownsArt Spiegelman’s Breakdowns, his first anthology of autobiographical and experimental comics was originally published in 1978. Hard to believe that thirty years later, a new edition, …

Steven Heller|Essays

Where Have You Gone R. Cobb?

Cartoon by Ron Cobb, 1966In 1968 the two most influential underground newspaper cartoonists in America were R. Crumb, who most everyone knows today, and R. Cobb, who sadly many do not. Crumb devastated establishment pieties while Cobb …

Steven Heller|Essays

Clipping Art, One Engraving At a Time

Clip Art: Old Engravings and Illustrations, edited by Dick Sutphen While thinning out my hayloft of a design library recently, I came across a dusty collection of books that had not been opened in many, many years. Yet, as I began turning …

Paula Scher|Essays

It’s How You Said It

Paula Scher: “The problem with the New Yorker’s controversial Obama cover is not that it’s dangerous and tasteless. The problem is that it isn’t dangerous or tasteless enough.”

William Drenttel|Slideshows

Thoughts on Democracy, July 4 2008

During the summer of 1942, the American painter and illustrator Norman Rockwell embarked on a series of paintings that would come to be known as "The Four Freedoms." Inspired by an impassioned speech President Roosevelt had made a year …

Debbie Millman|Audio

Laurie Rosenwald

On this episode of Design Matters with Debbie Millman, Debbie talks with graphic designer, artist and actress Laurie Rosenwald.

Debbie Millman|Audio

Stefan Bucher

An interview with graphic designer, illustrator and Daily Monster creator Stefan Bucher.

Debbie Millman|Audio

Luba Lukova

An interview with award-winning illustrator Luba Lukova, whose work is included in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, The Library of Congress and Bibliotheque Nationale in France. 

Debbie Millman|Audio

Maira Kalman

An interview with the remarkable Maira Kalman — the closest thing we in the United States have to a National Treasure.

Debbie Millman|Audio

Art Chantry

Art Chantry works and lives in Seattle where his ideas and personal style branded the look of popular culture, not only in the northwest and its bohemian underground, but also in the pop and alternative culture of the last few …