Luis Ortiz (1) (1949–)

Nice illustrated biography of the underappreciated artist and illustrator [a:Lee Brown Coye|2917002|Lee Brown Coye|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]. Other retrospectives have better artwork presentation but this is the most comprehensive actual biography by far. The text is awkward at times but the information and chronology is all there and Ortiz does manage to present the man behind the artwork. It also presents a good overview of his non-weird artwork which is often neglected by others. Lots of color plates as well as photographs.

The one negative, and it is only a slight one, is the layout. The text and artwork don't follow chronologically very well so you will find yourself paging back and forth to match up illustrations with the text. Bibliography, footnotes, and index are all handy. Gobs and gobs of illustrations, almost too many. It could have used more full-page graphics.

The book is printed on a heavy high gloss magazine type stock which I'm not sure I'm a big fan of. It gives it a bit of an amateur look. It has the sort of shiny slick cover I always associate with textbooks from my grammar school days.

I have always felt that Coye was much better than his contemporaries at capturing the truly uncanny in his book and pulp illustrations, much more so than the more heralded [a:Virgil Finlay|348643|Virgil Finlay|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1360990626p2/348643.jpg] or [a:Hannes Bok|205038|Hannes Bok|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1250179378p2/205038.jpg]. His illustrations had just the right touch of weird along with a gallows sort of humor to them.… (altro)

This lavishly illustrated book covers the commercial art and film-making of Edmund Emshwiller, nickname Emsh,, a very successful cover artist, mostly in the genre of science fiction and fantasy, but also in crime and men's pulp magazines and book covers. He eventually gave up this work in favor of making art films. Most of the reproductions are in color, unless they are of line-drawings, which of course are in black-and-white. A few pieces are in black-and-white, but are described as having color; perhaps the original did not survive. If one is interested in this artist, in particular, or in cover art, particularly in these genre, the book is not to be missed.

Emshwiller's wife, Carol, a science fiction and fantasy writer is also discussed at some length in the book. She very definitely takes second place, but the author is sensitive to her predicament of trying to pursue her own career in the face of raising children and being very supportive of her husband. Carol Emshwiller also studied art, but does not appear to have continued with it as a married adult. She turned instead to writing, often science fiction, but she also wrote more literary works. Ortiz is editing a series of volumes of her short stories.… (altro)