NORMAN
BLAINE SAUNDERS (1907-1989) painted astoundingly beautiful and humorously
irreverent illustrations through his career that spanned six decades.
In 1927, while still in his teens, he parlayed lessons from a correspondence
art course into a few magazines sales, then headed to the Chicago
Art Institute on a full scholarship. Before he could enroll, however,
he was hired by Fawcett Publications, where he contributed to many
of their periodicals for the next six years. When the company relocated
in New York in 1934, he went with them and found his fortune in painting
covers for pulp magazines.
To expand his aesthetic abilities, he enrolled in the Grand Central
School of Art, to study painting with N. C. Wyeth protage Harvey Dunn,
whose techniques and philosophy on art had a profound impact. After
WW2 Army service in China's infamous Burma Road, he resumed his career
of paintings scenes of manly adventure with a renewed vigor of informed
confidence. In addition to pulp work Saunders subsequently worked
for top magazine publishers, paperbacks, men's periodicals, calendars,
comic books, and trading cards, including the Civil War, Batman, Wacky
Packs, and legendary Mars Attacks! series.
He retired from commercial art in the 1980s and died in 1989 at age
82. His son, David Saunders, maintains an online gallery of his father's
work on the worldwide web at www.normansaunders.com
