THE FANTASTIC PULP ART OF NORMAN SAUNDERS
Saturday, June 5th, 2010Anyone who has seen any assortment of paperback or men’s magazine covers from the 40’s to 60’s has most certainly gawked in wonder at more than a few that were painted by one of the kings of the genre, Norman Saunders. Saunders was a prolific illustrator who was known for turning out high quality paintings within tight deadlines. He is most remembered for his lurid crime scene type paintings with gun totting tough guys and even tougher gals in dramatically lit poses. But he was able to handle most any design themes the magazine field including combat, westerns, science fiction and even sports illustrations. He also painted a famous series of trading cards for Topps in 1962 called Mars Attacks whose images later inspired Tim Burton to create his film of the same name. He was born Normand Blaine Sanders (he signed a lot of his work Blaine that he did outside his main job at Fawcett) in 1907. He would later drop the ‘d’ from Normand. At the age of three he suffered an accident that left him blind for six months. Luckily his sight was restored after several surgeries and he soon began drawing everything he saw, no doubt in appreciation for his restored vision. He was hired by Fawcett Publications and as the story goes he unknowingly hitched a ride with a couple bank robbers from North Dakota who had the young Saunders keep lookout for cops from the back of their Model-T. He was a hard working artist whose work did not seem to suffer from their rushed qualities. The colors are bright and lurid and the content is consistently exciting and dangerously erotic. It is the because of the work of men like Saunders that the artwork from the pulps now are treasured by collectors over what was produced in the ‘slicks’ of the same period. I could never tire of looking at stuff like this.























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