Welcome to the New Year and the first blog of (hopefully) many for 2013
Still finding bits of original artwork and this one seem appropriate for the occasion. It is for the 1971 edition of “The Roots Of Health” by Leon Petulengro (0330 025635) The artwork itself, unfortunately not signed, is in excellent condition but the transparent has darkened considerably.
This is the original artwork for a PAN title from 1971 which I recently acquired. Unfortunately it is not signed nor is the artist acknowledge on the book cover. It is part of a series of this authors work all done in a similar style. If you want to know the answer scroll down for the answer link.
As this will be the last blog before Christmas can I just wish all our readers a very happy one and a successful book buying New Year.
Click here to see from which book the artwork comes. I do have some more from this series which I will be adding when I find them and of course if you know who the artist might be I’m sure you’ll let me know!
The latest copy of “This England” has a four page article on Ian Fleming and James Bond illustrated with several of the PAN Bond covers from the 1960s.
I recently spotted an edition of ‘The Captain’ by Jan de Hartog which made me look twice. I had the 1969 reprint version with a cover by Paul Wright but this looked different. It is the 1968 edition but why did PAN need to change the cover only a year later and produce two so similar?
1968 1969
I recently ended up buying my own Christmas present which doesn’t seem quite right but if you want to be sure you get what your after then it’s the only way.
This time it was the original artwork for the cover of the 1982 edition of ‘The Chequer Board’ by Nevil Shute painted by George Sharp. We think George painted 22 of the 23 Shute titles apart from ‘A Town Like Alice’ which may only of had a TV tie-in cover but if you know better please let me know especially those in Australia.
I have several pieces of original artwork mostly around the 12″ by 15″ size but I’ll let you guess what size my latest piece is? To find the answer just click on the picture below.
I sent a message to Tony Knight via his site and he replied that he is very happy for me to publish this (spoof?) item although I’m not sure all the other people mentioned would agree! I am also very grateful to Tony for sending me several example of the ‘Invisible Ink Puzzle Books’ as they are very few and far between and even better most of them still have their pens attached!
After visiting Val Biro I came back up through Woking the next day to visit Ken Hatherley. Ken started at PAN in the 1970’s and worked his way up to be Studio Manager in the 80’s We have communicated before but this was a chance to meet up in person and for me to see some of Ken’s bit and pieces. It turned out to be an expensive visit as I bought my Christmas present, the original artwork for a George Sharp cover, and a couple of original artworks for Piccolo titles off him. I have put together a page for Ken and added him to the Artists link at the top which now becomes Artist etc to give a wider scope for inclusion.
On my recent travels I picked up a printing block for the back cover of “The Explorer” by Somerset Maugham. These are not often found as they were usually recycled but the problem is which edition is it from? I have a second printing and although the ‘blurb’ is the same the layout isn’t.
I have put together a page to show the PAN/Piccolo related artwork that Val produced over many years. The page can be found by clicking on the Artists etc link at the top of this blog or by choosing More and then Artists from the main website or click here.
Dear Tim,
Wow! What a fine display of my work! So many of my Pan covers, and also my Pan Gumdrops! It is all put together beautifully, including the photos you took in my studio. Thank you for your interest, and your skill!
Very best wishes,
Val
I was very pleased to be able to meet up with world famous book illustrator Val Biro last Sunday, it was a pleasure to spend the afternoon with him in his studio in West Sussex. I think he was pleasantly surprised to see the 20 or so PAN covers I took, all from the early 50’s that he had forgotten he had produced. He also signed all my Piccolo ‘Gumdrop’ books and I am putting a page together about him this week.
If you want to find out more about Val, Cameron Cunningham runs the excellent official Val Biro website.
