A humorous and telling letter from Hal Foster to Milton Caniff. Two artists whose drawing styles couldn’t have been more different.
Category: Cartooning
The Hold of Holbein
Back in February, The New Yorker had a review of an exhibit at the Morgan Library in New York.
Hans Holbein the Younger’s work is stunning, being vastly superior to his father’s art. The quality and immediate visual appeal of Holbein’s paintings wouldn’t be equaled until Vermeer a hundred years later. While displaying the same level of technical skill as Jan Van Eyck in painting decorative clothing and objects, Holbein’s superb drawing ability was a complete break with long-standing medieval artistic conventions. Offering a level of realism never seen before, Holbein was, in a word, modern. If Holbein’s portraits are secular Realism, Michelangelo’s paintings are religious Mannerism.
I have beheld Holbein’s portraits of Thomas More and his nemesis Cromwell at the Frick Gallery. The painting of More was an obvious labor of love compared to the spare and cold portrayal of Cromwell, making it quite plain which of the two men he favored. Cromwell proved that anyone who believes they can ally themselves politically with a madman, and survive unscathed, is dead wrong. If you have an interest in Holbein, and can spare an hour, this history is very worthwhile viewing. (Two completely different meanings of the word “spare” used in the same paragraph! That’s what I call blogging at its best.)
There’s a woman in the cartoon* above whose pose is strikingly similar to Leonardo Da Vinci’s Lady With An Ermine. The way her hands are placed, she could be holding an ermine herself. Even the head covering and bead necklace echo those worn by Da Vinci’s woman.
Da Vinci probably painted the portrait about five years before Holbein was born. Was Holbein merely fashioning the drawing in the popular manner of the day? Or had he seen Da Vinci’s portrait of Cecilia Gallerani, or a copy of it, and was offering a sly nod to the Italian master? While unknown, it’s believed that Holbein may have visited Italy. Da Vinci died when Holbein the Younger was about twenty.
* “Cartoon” in its original meaning is a preliminary drawing for a painting.
48 Hours: Mystery Solved!
Follow-up to my post from two days ago.
July 17, 2022 on DogRat.com: A sudden spike in attention appears for a certain, long-idle blog post from 2008. Why? What could the possible interest have been, and why on July 17? Gumshoe Denro was put on the case, bringing it to a speedy conclusion! July 17, 2022 on Oxygen True Crime: https://www.oxygen.com/snapped/crime-news/why-shirley-nelson-attempted-murder-suicide-at-peanuts-office
Attempted Murder Mystery
This is what the Google Search Console says about this site:
Your site doesn’t have enough usage data
Which is actually an improvement considering that, before I fixed the WordPress problems, Google refused to even allow the domain to appear in a search. Curiously, on July 17, one of my old posts suddenly received more than 2,500 hits. This one.
Why the sudden interest? Dunno!
Follow-up:
Today at 2!
Only a couple of hours to go for the Zoom call celebrating the Sparky Schulz Centennial.
https://osu.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_5qjPOQ8jSQiV8QrPt6CP4A
In progress.
Voices Gone But Not Forgotten
The audio from my copy of THE VOICES OF MARVEL flexi-disc is being featured on Boing Boing. Sadly, everyone who is heard on the record is now gone.
https://boingboing.net/2022/07/12/listen-to-a-rare-flexi-disc-record-of-stan-lee-jack-kirby-and-the-voices-of-marvel-from-1964.html
The scripted and rehearsed recording was made in 1965, during Wally Wood’s brief stint working for Stan. Steve Ditko was still at Marvel, but he isn’t heard. Jack Kirby later regretted participating, despite his apparent enthusiasm at the time. Joe Sinnott didn’t return to the Bullpen until a few months later.
I know that one of my audio transfers was used for the video shared on Boing Boing, because of the “thump” heard while artist Don Heck is talking. The audio was captured lovingly and with careful attention to detail, using high-quality audio equipment, as I explained here fifteen years ago.