Arnold Zwicky's Blog

On the cover of the 11/25 issue of the New Yorker, Wayne Thiebaud’s “Stuffed”:

(#1)

Accompanied by a cover story by Françoise Mouly from 11/18/19, a charming interview with the 99-year-old artist.

(Other Thiebaud food covers for the magazine: “Jolly Cones” 8/19&26/02, “Harvest Display” 11/24/08, “Pumpkin Cloud” 11/23/09.)

The intro to the interview:

At ninety-nine, Wayne Thiebaud — one of America’s greatest painters, and certainly its premier painter of food — is still going strong. This is Thiebaud’s ninth cover for the magazine, and it riffs on one of his previous paintings, an image of a turkey that he started in 2009. A sharp viewer might pick out the added details and embellishments, but more striking, perhaps, are the Thiebaud hallmarks that remain the same: soft light, clear color, a blue shadow pooling around a plate. We recently called Thiebaud at his home, in Sacramento, to talk about his work.

From the interview, WT talking about cartooning:

I probably submitted as many as two to three hundred cartoons to the magazine —  they were never accepted! But I’m a big fan of cartoonists, and even collect original cartoons. Some of my heroes are George Price, Helen Hokinson, Peter Arno. I could probably name another twenty or thirty.

I came to New York in 1946, after getting out of the service, specifically to try to sell cartoons. And I sold to trade magazines, but I could never make it in The New Yorker — you people have too high a standard! At one point, I had a conversation with John Updike, who had been a cartoonist at the Harvard Lampoon, and we both cried together about never being able to get our stuff into The New Yorker.

From his early cartooning period, a rough drawing (not inked) from 1950:

(#2) (from a gallery listing for the drawing)

And then, much later (from 1988), an homage to Disney:

(#2) WT’s Mickey Mouse

See my 12/5/16 posting “Wayne Thiebaud” on the artist, his still lifes (especially of food), California landscapes and cityscapes, and portraiture (often reminiscent of Edward Hopper).

This entry was posted on November 26, 2019 at 11:27 am and is filed under Art, Holidays, Language and food, Linguistics in the comics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.