anthropomorphic lobsters

Untitled pencil drawings for unknown project,
discovered in 1960s sketchbook

summer fun

Illustration detail, "What is Automation," Collier's magazine, March 16, 1956. The optimistic take: "Automation has been heralded by some as the threshold to a new Utopia, in which robots do all the work while human drones recline in pneumatic bliss." There was a counterbalancing pessimistic view, but in observance of the current summer heat wave, we'll stick with the sunshinier forecast. 

We're still looking forward to consumer helicopters with open-air cockpits.

Jim Flora 2012 Calendars

Those perennial favorite Jim Flora calendars are in stock for 2012. You've got your bug-eyed saxophonist, an Aren't-We-Having-Fun? moon, and a manic drummer to guide you through the coming Leap Year. These are hand-printed mini-calendars measuring 10" x 4-1/2".  If you prefer something of greater magnitude in a maritime motif, our Sheffield Island poster-sized calendar should suit your tastes:

Baltimore

Baltimore, tempera on heavy stock, early 1960s

Salt Pond - Block Island

Salt Pond - Block Island, tempera and pencil on paper, 1963. This previously uncirculated work was first published in our 2009 anthology, The Sweetly Diabolic Art of Jim Flora (the only one of our three Flora compendiums currently in print). The work reflects Flora's love of rustic maritime locales and things that float.

Block Island, Rhode Island is located off the southern coast of the state. Wiki contains the following about the saline pond:

Great Salt Pond Archeological District is a historic spot in New Shoreham, Rhode Island. The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1990. The Great Salt Pond is a round and almost entirely enclosed body of water separating the north and south regions of Block Island. The pond has a small channel on its northwest shore connecting it with Block Island Sound. The opening is artificial and was dug out in 1895 to make a harbor in the south part of the pond.

Rowayton Creature Tableau (new print)

Our latest Jim Flora limited edition fine art print launches today. We've dubbed the untitled, undated black and white work Rowayton Creature Tableau because of the strange figures populating the streets of this seaside Connecticut village (the artist's adopted hometown). The previously uncirculated and unpublished pen & ink with watercolor drawing was discovered in the artist's collection. We've analyzed the technique and determined that it reflects the 1970s style of caricature commonly found in Flora's children's books of that decade.

Flora lived in Rowayton from the mid-1940s to his death in 1998. Over the years he rendered scenes from the town dozens of times (see our recently released Bell Island at Night print) in a variety of media. The creature tableau is one of his more playful portraits of the town.

Rowayton Creature Tableau has been issued in a numbered, limited edition of 25 prints at a price of $150 (+s/h) each. Prices will increase as the edition sells down.

Bell Island at Night (new print)

JimFlora.com has released a new fine art print. The panoramic Bell Island at Night was adapted from a 1968 tempera in which Flora provided a surreal nocturnal impression of his neighbors and neighborhood. Bell Island is part of Rowayton CT, and the Flora family lived on the island at 7 St. James from the late 1940s to Flora's death in 1998.

The archival-quality fine art print has been released in an edition of 30 at a launch price of $160. As with all our Flora fine art prints, prices increase as the edition sells down. The image area is 10-1/2" high x 17-1/2" wide and centered on an untrimmed 13" x 19" sheet.

Bell Island at Night

We return from a fine art print hiatus with our first new work of 2011: Bell Island at Night, a 1968 tempera in which Flora provides a surreal nocturnal impression of his neighbors. Bell Island is part of Rowayton (which in turn is part of Norwalk, CT), and the Flora family lived on the island at 7 St. James from the late 1940s to Flora's death in 1998. Our newest fine art print will be launched in an edition of 30 in the next week or two. We'll re-post this info upon launch. The print is currently in the final proofing stages.

Walter Beartree & the Boo-Saying Whale

Flora authored and illustrated 17 children's books under his own name between 1955 (The Fabulous Firework Family) and 1982 (Grandpa's Witched-Up Christmas). A milk crate in the Flora archives contains contracts and correspondence for each one. Most of the letters passed between the author/artist and his legendary editress, Margaret McElderry.

The crate is also stuffed with manila folders for dozens of abandoned or rejected book ideas. Walter Beartree and the Boo-Saying Whale does not have a folder, but these pencil roughs were discovered in a sketchbook from the mid-1950s.

red and black ship

Untitled, undated (ca. mid-1960s) ship in cross-cut view. Previously unpublished and uncirculated work (rendered in tempera and pencil) discovered in sketchpad.

Sheffield Island 2011 letterpress calendar

JimFlora.com is offering a new 2011 poster-sized calendar featuring a 1954 Flora woodcut illustration called SHEFFIELD ISLAND. The artwork is hand-printed letterpress in black ink on kraft card stock; a 12-month tear away calendar is attached on the bottom. When the year ends, you have a unique hand-pulled letterpress Jim Flora print suitable for framing.

The full dimensions of the card with artwork are 13-1/2" x 17". The calendars, which were hand-printed by Yee-Haw Industrial Letterpress, of Knoxville, sell for $25.00 (+ shipping) each.

Sheffield Island (partial scan)

Partial scan (about one-third, with color checker card) of unpublished 1954 woodcut print Sheffield Island. The original block is in the Flora family collection. Only a handful of original artist prints exist. We are contemplating issuing a new limited edition run of the complete work next year.

fishing in New Orleans

Detail from a series of woodcuts Flora produced as a freelancer for the Union Central Life Insurance Company of Cincinnati around 1940. They were reproduced in UCL's monthly Agency Bulletin to illustrate articles about the history and legacy of the Crescent City. The images proved so popular they were issued as a limited edition folio by the company in 1942.

Flora later admitted that at the time he produced the woodcuts, he had never visited New Orleans; he'd based his images on photos of the city and on literature about the region.

A previous post about this woodcut series depicted Jackson Square.

Ferris Wheel Fireworks (new print)

Today we launch a new Jim Flora fine art print: Ferris Wheel Fireworks, adapted from Flora's second kiddie book, The Day the Cow Sneezed (1957). The long-sought book will be reprinted this fall by Enchanted Lion. At that time we'll issue a print of the book cover, which includes the artist's fabulous hand-typography. However, during the image restoration process, Flora archivist/printmaker Barbara Economon saw the print possibilities of the book's chaotic two-page (34-35) tableau. The book's sequence of catastrophic events that caused the above turmoil were triggered by a cow's sneeze.

The work is now available as a limited edition (30), archival-quality fine art print.

moptops on deck

Untitled pen & ink and tempera (or watercolor) on paper from the late 1980s/early 1990s, featuring a colorful zoom-in on an ocean liner with three faceless moptops on deck. This work dates from the close of Flora's maritime period (1980s), probably around the time, as he told an interviewer in the 1990s, that he'd "painted himself out of ships." His large maritime canvases of the 1980s were historically based, spectacularly detailed and less primitive. In the early 1990s his fine art reverted to a more playful and elemental style reminiscent of his work from the 1940s thru the mid-1970s.

ship and helmsman

Untitled, undated, unfinished ship and helmsman sketches; tempera and pencil in sketchbook. These drafts, which probably date from the early to mid-1950s, are juxtaposed on the page as shown.

seaside setting

Detail (about two-thirds of the complete work) of an untitled, unpublished tempera on board, ca. mid-1960s. The collection contains a number of similarly composed maritime paintings from this period, though colors and figures vary. If you have our recent book, The Sweetly Diabolic Art of Jim Flora, compare this setting with Salt Pond—Block Island on page 54.

Lobster Pound (1962)

Taking a break from conjuring bonus-limbed mutants and bug-eyed boppers, Flora often sketched maritime culture in his extended backyard. The above untitled pen & ink of a seafood shack was discovered in a travel sketchbook that contained dozens of the artist's impressions of Italy and France, several dated 1962. Back on his "home surf," Flora filled another two dozen pages of the tablet with southern Connecticut shoreline vignettes and briny motifs.

cordial claws

Anthropomorphic lobsters from sketchbook, pencil and crayon, early 1960s. Intended project unknown.

peek skills

This cutaway view of a cruise ship affords a glimpse into cabin and deck activities—some naughty, some nice. The undated, unpublished pen & ink on tablet paper probably dates from Flora's "late ship period" around 1988-90, when he was transitioning away from maritime motifs and back to music, architecture, portraits, and landscapes. His large acrylic ship canvases rendered during the 1980s were more lifelike than the cartoonish styles for which he'd been renowned as a commercial illustrator. The untitled work above is a return to form of sorts, although it's not what we'd consider a top-tier effort. (The thumbnail is minuscule; click on image to enlarge.)

Flora produced countless cutaway-view paintings and drawings of ships and buildings (and a handful of humans) over the years. It was a recurring motif in his fine art and in his commercial assignments. Previous examples can be viewed here. A wonderful (and violent) early 1950s tempera tableau we've issued as a fine art print exhibits the same structural voyeurism.