Juvenilia

I found these marker drawings in a folder of art work I made when I was 10 or 11. That would have been 1983 or 1984. I think they capture my youthful enthusiasm for music and graphic design.

Daily Book Graphics #39 / Saab Scans

These illustrations are from The Saab-Scania Story, a book published by Saab to commemorate their 50th anniversary in 1987. A letter I found inside seems to indicate that all 1987 Saab buyers got a free copy of the book. Unfortunately the cut-away diagrams of the Viggen wouldn't fit on my scanner.

Quantas

I forgot where I found this on the web but I just re-found it on my desktop. Pretty cool.

Daily Book Graphics #38 / Point-of-Purchase

This book jacket is in pretty bad shape. There are a few interesting design samples in the book, but it's more interesting as time capsule (published in 1968).

Daily Book Graphics #37 / Insects of Japan

I bought Field Guide Vol. 11 Insects of Japan (©1993) in Tokyo last year. I generally don't like photography based field guides (despite being the author of one), but this one does it right. The photographs in this book are all very crisp and give more space around the subject than most photo guides.

Daily Book Graphics #36 / Man and Space

These graphics come from the Time-Life Science Library book Man and Space. It was published in 1966 during ramp up to the moon missions.

Scajaquada Snapper

I spent the morning on the Scajaquada Creek taking pictures that may become part of a new project. I spotted a snapping turtle swimming near the surface of the water. The turtle's shell was probably about a foot long. Not too big by snapper size standards, but I think I'm always measuring against the picture of an Alligator Snapper below.




This is from the book Florida's Fabulous Reptiles and Amphibians. I've been fascinated with this image for years.

Daily Book Graphics #35 / Birds of Hong Kong

I bought this 1976 field guide few years ago at used book store in Buffalo. I love the cover, unfortunately there are only a few color plates on the inside.

Daily Book Graphics #34 / Year Book of Agriculture

I found this book yesterday at Old Editions book shop in downtown Buffalo. I bought it solely for the cover which I think is brilliant. The full title is Outdoors USA: The Yearbook of Agriculture 1967, it was published by the Department of Agriculture. The book is meant to explain to the general public what the USDA is doing to conserve our natural resources. I posted on the 1968 Yearbook of Agriculture back in February of last year, this is the cover of that book. I couldn't find a design or illustration credit for either book.

Daily Book Graphics #33 / Catalogues

When the Albright Knox Gallery Book store had a big sale a couple of years ago I bought a lot of old catalogues. These are only good for their covers, the insides are dreary black and white. The Calder booklet was published by MOMA in 1969.

Pepper Sneakers

There is a Beverly Pepper sculpture entitled Maxi Zig Zag stuck in a corner of the Central Buffalo Public Library. I really like Pepper's work from the late 1960's, although I'm not sure why. In any case, I noticed that someone had stuck a large die cut sticker of sneakers on the sculpture. It is sort of a funny juxtaposition. I wonder if they will need to hire an art conservationist to scrape it off.

Daily Book Graphics #32 / The Old Stone Age

I've been meaning to do some more reading about the stone age. I suppose I should get a more up to date book than this one. ©1968, second impression 1970

Turning 36

Today is my 36th birthday. I think it is going to be a fairly normal day, I've got a lot to do. But here is a selective list of people born on March 24th courtesy of Wikipedia. If only we could all celebrate together.

1874 - Harry Houdini, (Weisz Erik), Hungarian-born magician (d. 1926)
1887 - Roscoe (Fatty) Arbuckle, American actor (d. 1933)
1924 - Norman Fell, American actor (d. 1998)
1930 - Steve McQueen, American actor (d. 1980)
1938 - Holger Czukay, German musician (Can)
1962 - Star Jones Reynolds, American television personality
1965 - The Undertaker, American professional wrestler
1976 - Peyton Manning, American football player

This is me (in the foreground) at my 5th birthday party in 1978.

Daily Book Graphics #31 / Birds of the Malay Peninsula

I bought this book in a used book store in Cleveland in 2005. This got me interested in collecting field guides from far away places (see some of the covers in this Flickr set). It was first published in 1960, this impression is from 1970. These illustrations by A. Fraser-Brunner are some of my favorite depictions of birds.

Daily Book Graphics #30 / Design from Scandinavia

I scanned these graphics from a catalogue called Design from Scandinavia which was published in the early 70s. I have four issues that used to belong to my father. Unfortunately they all got wet in at some point, so they in pretty rough shape. The catalogues are full of drool inducing furniture and interiors. There are a lot of recognizable pieces you find in the standard design books, but more interestingly, there are hundreds of great pieces that haven't made it into the canon.

Daily Book Graphics #29 / Botanical Nomenclature

I'm cheating a bit with this post since I previously posted this cover over a year ago. But I really wanted to include it in this project, so here it is. I bought this book at a discarded book sale at the Buffalo Museum of Science. It's certainly not worth reading, even if I did know something about botanical nomenclature it would be well out of date by now. I bought it because it is a really nice example of the Dutch (it was published in Utrecht) graphic design of the era. I couldn't find a design credit.

Daily Book Graphics #28 / Le Corbusier

Another one of my Uncle John's books. He worked on The Carpenter Center in Boston, Le Corbusier's only US building. The book was published in 1960, it measures 6.5 x 4.5 inches.

Daily Book Graphics #27 / Life and its Marvels

These illustrations come from the International Pictorial Treasury of Knowledge book series, published in 1960. The title of this book is Life and its Marvels: Plant, Animal, Human. I picked up four books from the series at a garage sale a few years ago. The illustrations in these books are fantastic and sometimes strange. The layout for all of the books features a page of text across from a page of related illustrations. The caption for the image page is at the bottom of the text page. I will have more from this series later in the project.

Olfactory organs

Aquatic nests

Different types of stomachs

Daily Book Graphics #26 / Late Modern

Another Helvetica oriented book cover design (and art). ©1969, 1975