Jon Whitcomb
Cosmopolitan Magazine Cover of a Glamorous, Sophisticated Woman, 1949
Gouache on Illustration Board
15 × 12 1/4 in | 38.1 × 31.1 cm
Copyright The Artist
$ 30,000.00
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Mid-century Cosmopolitan Magazine Cover of a glamorous, sophisticated woman in highly stylish leopard skin gloves and a hat, striking a graphic pose. This artwork is an icon of American mid-century...
Mid-century Cosmopolitan Magazine Cover of a glamorous, sophisticated
woman in highly stylish leopard skin gloves and a hat, striking a
graphic pose. This artwork is an icon of American mid-century commercial
art and design. It was published on the cover of Cosmopolitan Magazine,
October 1949. For a 1949 post-war American audience, this work embodies
the pinnacle of fashion, class, and style, and would set a visual
benchmark for the magazine's female audience. Technically, it's a
couture-de-force, with a simple, highly graphic design that frames and
enhances the subject's beauty. Whitcomb's painting style reduces all
pictorial elements to their absolute minimum. The absence of any
distracting details draws the viewer's attention to the subject's dreamy
eyes and mouth. The painting's bold simplicity and crisp manner of
execution and design almost prefigure the work of painters like Alex
Katz. Yet Whitcomb was a commercial artist who may have served as a
reference for more modern painters, even Katz. Whitcomb's distinctive
strength is that he gets his anatomy right without exaggeration or
cartoonism. Today, a whole school of ultra-contemporary museum-level
artists refers to, or outright copies, mid-century illustrators such as
Whitcomb. Yet sadly, Whitcomb is not recognized and is not yet in the
fine art canon. This omission makes him even more important as a
commercial artist and fine art artist. Currently unframed, Signed lower
right: Jon Whitcomb.
woman in highly stylish leopard skin gloves and a hat, striking a
graphic pose. This artwork is an icon of American mid-century commercial
art and design. It was published on the cover of Cosmopolitan Magazine,
October 1949. For a 1949 post-war American audience, this work embodies
the pinnacle of fashion, class, and style, and would set a visual
benchmark for the magazine's female audience. Technically, it's a
couture-de-force, with a simple, highly graphic design that frames and
enhances the subject's beauty. Whitcomb's painting style reduces all
pictorial elements to their absolute minimum. The absence of any
distracting details draws the viewer's attention to the subject's dreamy
eyes and mouth. The painting's bold simplicity and crisp manner of
execution and design almost prefigure the work of painters like Alex
Katz. Yet Whitcomb was a commercial artist who may have served as a
reference for more modern painters, even Katz. Whitcomb's distinctive
strength is that he gets his anatomy right without exaggeration or
cartoonism. Today, a whole school of ultra-contemporary museum-level
artists refers to, or outright copies, mid-century illustrators such as
Whitcomb. Yet sadly, Whitcomb is not recognized and is not yet in the
fine art canon. This omission makes him even more important as a
commercial artist and fine art artist. Currently unframed, Signed lower
right: Jon Whitcomb.