Fuchs was a brilliant designer, who lived at a time when Art Directors and editors respected talent and gave freedom to the illustrators to do spreads for editorial pieces, which ran in many of the national magazines. When I met him, he was deep into the oil-wash technique, basically a subtractive approach. This was after he had a very successful start doing car work out of Chicago (using water-based mediums) and then got more into edtiorial work in NY, along with Mark English and other gifted artists. Basically, his early approach was to lay out the design using pencil roughs on tracing paper, then project reference onto illustration board, fix the drawing, and build up from washes. Most of the early work I was lucky to see, in the back rooms at the Curtis Publishing Company, looked like gouache or casein opaque strokes over heavy pencil, before he moved into Acrylic. They were small pieces, with faces always in overhead shadow, very simply done but the strong design pulled it all together. Later, he used his own slide photos on assignments, especially for sports, to project onto unstretched canvas, working toward a tilted design, or forced overlapping of elements, until he came up with something interesting. Using oils, he worked in small sections, around 10x10", staining the canvas, then pulling out highlights, with the projector still on, in a dim room. I point this out because, as he described it, the dim room (a single light on his canvas and palette) dulled the projected photo(s) down so that only a minimum of contrast came through.This effect is similar to looking through a hazy filter that darkens everything and merges shadows and some highlights. He said it would often take him a week to do a large piece, and I'm sure he painted over the matte, dry areas to enhance that stained-glass look. Living in Westport, pre-computers, he was lucky to have a library there with librarians who would do extensive searches for him through their huge morgue of images. But I think his best work came from his own photos where he was able to get unusual angles that enhanced his great design instinct. The main reason we don't see that kind of creative illustration today is that Art Directors are simply not able to sketch out rough ideas; they rely too much on stock and have a very weak design sense, based more on rehashed typography themes. And Editors today have no vision of how illustration can sell an idea. Photography can now be picked up anywhere to plug into a dull ad, so few ADs have the courage to present a creative, artistic idea to clients and tell them its going to cost more. I could see this coming for years when the schools kept pushing easy concepts and no illustration and design skills. Fortunately for Bernie and a few others, they rode the last wave of creative spreads, ads and corporate work that allowed them to produce some remarkable pieces, a real later day renaissance for the US illustrators and designers.
Hey 👋 Charles! Great video presentation. Back when I was 21, 47 years ago, as a recent art school grad, I wanted to meet Bernie Fuchs, so living in Darien- the town next door, I drove over and knocked on his door where he lived in Westport. His wife answered, and told me he was in the city that day. I remember there were two Porsches in the long driveway. Bernie had an expansive home on a beautiful wooded lot. Money money money. Bernie was one of the best! I particularly liked his sensitive line drawings, portraits, on TV Guide covers. I got pretty good at emulating those at the time. As I’m sure many did.
I admit at first when I saw the video length I was about to jump ship but the more I saw the more I realized I needed to see. Great study with so many interesting insight
I worked for a top car illustrator Rich Delcarson, who told me about Bernie Fuchs, how he was amazing an artist paintings those backgrounds for RICH'S CAR PAINTINGS. Rich was an amazing illustrator too. He had his car paintings hanging on the walls of his ad agency/art studio, and I used to just stare at those in awe.
Thank for your comment and glad you found this to be an interesting journey whose destination is to learn more about what goes into the making of exceptional pictures like what Bernie Fuchs did. Charles Bernard
Hi, so I put together a huge Sports Illustrated / sports magazine collection together back in the early 2000's and stuck them in a closet. I just found out in January that many of them are now worth a small fortune. I love history and decided that before I sell them, I'm going to do a few videos on the collection and a few key issues first. The son of somebody on the very first cover from 1954 lives close to me and I interviewed him for a video highlighting the first cover. Turns out he's an artist and reveres Bernie Fuchs. So now I'm doing a deep dive on Bernie Fuchs. Bernie did 9 covers for Sports illustrated and my favorite is the '74 issue of OJ Simpson. I'm loving his art myself and really enjoy many of his car adds. In doing my homework on Bernie, I see his son doesn't live that far from me. In the off chance he watches videos of his father and reads the comments, or someone that knows Bernie's son who could get a message to him, I'd love the chance to do a quick interview and it would be an extra special treat to get my artist friend with a connection to SI together with him. Thanks.
Hey there. I acquired a B fuchs signed numbered print and have scoured the depths of the web for any info on it and can't find a thing. Would you be willing to take a look for me please? Thanks
@@gcxred4kat9 Some of my LPs are poorly filed but I've found a Dean Martin; "The Dean Martin Show." Dean wears black tie and leans on his left elbow. Also, Frank Sinatra "Frank and Nancy" a pretty basic triple portrait sketch on a sepia background. I'm sure I have another Frank one somewhere with a full colour painting by Bernie but I haven't found it yet.
Hey 👋 Charles! One last comment. All one has to do is look at the art agencies- the artists, and illustrators they represent today. Every one is looking for that edge, and none of them come close- no originality, no creativity, none of the clarity of a Bernie Fuchs. As a 1973 graduate certificate holder of The Famous Artists School, nothing since then is worthy of the great ones whose materials you share.
Incredible resources. Thank you how do I access more information, to find out more about your course. There is only one page on yr website. I want to buy your whole course but feel uncertain about what it actually contains and want to find out more about the course before I spend 199 dollars. Feel like you need to flesh out yr webpage a bit. Has anyone else bought the course?
Where you see the graphics labeled Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 click on each of those graphics which will take you to a page that lists everything you will be learning for that part that you clicked on, which as you’ll see is a lot. Sorry it wasn’t made clear on my website. I’ll make a change to make it clear.
Fuchs was a brilliant designer, who lived at a time when Art Directors and editors respected talent and gave freedom to the illustrators to do spreads for editorial pieces, which ran in many of the national magazines. When I met him, he was deep into the oil-wash technique, basically a subtractive approach. This was after he had a very successful start doing car work out of Chicago (using water-based mediums) and then got more into edtiorial work in NY, along with Mark English and other gifted artists. Basically, his early approach was to lay out the design using pencil roughs on tracing paper, then project reference onto illustration board, fix the drawing, and build up from washes. Most of the early work I was lucky to see, in the back rooms at the Curtis Publishing Company, looked like gouache or casein opaque strokes over heavy pencil, before he moved into Acrylic. They were small pieces, with faces always in overhead shadow, very simply done but the strong design pulled it all together.
Later, he used his own slide photos on assignments, especially for sports, to project onto unstretched canvas, working toward a tilted design, or forced overlapping of elements, until he came up with something interesting. Using oils, he worked in small sections, around 10x10", staining the canvas, then pulling out highlights, with the projector still on, in a dim room. I point this out because, as he described it, the dim room (a single light on his canvas and palette) dulled the projected photo(s) down so that only a minimum of contrast came through.This effect is similar to looking through a hazy filter that darkens everything and merges shadows and some highlights. He said it would often take him a week to do a large piece, and I'm sure he painted over the matte, dry areas to enhance that stained-glass look. Living in Westport, pre-computers, he was lucky to have a library there with librarians who would do extensive searches for him through their huge morgue of images. But I think his best work came from his own photos where he was able to get unusual angles that enhanced his great design instinct.
The main reason we don't see that kind of creative illustration today is that Art Directors are simply not able to sketch out rough ideas; they rely too much on stock and have a very weak design sense, based more on rehashed typography themes. And Editors today have no vision of how illustration can sell an idea. Photography can now be picked up anywhere to plug into a dull ad, so few ADs have the courage to present a creative, artistic idea to clients and tell them its going to cost more. I could see this coming for years when the schools kept pushing easy concepts and no illustration and design skills. Fortunately for Bernie and a few others, they rode the last wave of creative spreads, ads and corporate work that allowed them to produce some remarkable pieces, a real later day renaissance for the US illustrators and designers.
Hey 👋 Charles!
Great video presentation.
Back when I was 21, 47 years ago, as a recent art school grad, I wanted to meet Bernie Fuchs, so living in Darien- the town next door, I drove over and knocked on his door where he lived in Westport. His wife answered, and told me he was in the city that day. I remember there were two Porsches in the long driveway. Bernie had an expansive home on a beautiful wooded lot. Money money money. Bernie was one of the best! I particularly liked his sensitive line drawings, portraits, on TV Guide covers. I got pretty good at emulating those at the time. As I’m sure many did.
I admit at first when I saw the video length I was about to jump ship but the more I saw the more I realized I needed to see. Great study with so many interesting insight
I worked for a top car illustrator Rich Delcarson, who told me about Bernie Fuchs, how he was amazing an artist paintings those backgrounds for RICH'S CAR PAINTINGS. Rich was an amazing illustrator too. He had his car paintings hanging on the walls of his ad agency/art studio, and I used to just stare at those in awe.
I love and value all your work so much! Thank you for doing what you do
Love these long videos so much
Quite insightful
Thank you, I found this session extremely valuable.
Bravo Sir!!!! Excellent!!!!👏👏👏
Thank you for this interested journey. Thank you as well for the opportunity to learn more about good picture making. Hasta luego!
Thank for your comment and glad you found
this to be an interesting journey whose destination
is to learn more about what goes into the making
of exceptional pictures like what Bernie Fuchs did.
Charles Bernard
this is a treasure. thank yousomuch
Wonderful class! Thanks
Great thank you very much
Wonderful video thank you
Hi, so I put together a huge Sports Illustrated / sports magazine collection together back in the early 2000's and stuck them in a closet. I just found out in January that many of them are now worth a small fortune. I love history and decided that before I sell them, I'm going to do a few videos on the collection and a few key issues first. The son of somebody on the very first cover from 1954 lives close to me and I interviewed him for a video highlighting the first cover. Turns out he's an artist and reveres Bernie Fuchs. So now I'm doing a deep dive on Bernie Fuchs. Bernie did 9 covers for Sports illustrated and my favorite is the '74 issue of OJ Simpson. I'm loving his art myself and really enjoy many of his car adds. In doing my homework on Bernie, I see his son doesn't live that far from me. In the off chance he watches videos of his father and reads the comments, or someone that knows Bernie's son who could get a message to him, I'd love the chance to do a quick interview and it would be an extra special treat to get my artist friend with a connection to SI together with him. Thanks.
Hey there. I acquired a B fuchs signed numbered print and have scoured the depths of the web for any info on it and can't find a thing. Would you be willing to take a look for me please? Thanks
I have both Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra albums with Bernie Fuchs covers. As soon as I found them, I thought, I know that artist!
Any chance you could let me know the titles of those album covers? Thanks.
@@gcxred4kat9 Some of my LPs are poorly filed but I've found a Dean Martin; "The Dean Martin Show." Dean wears black tie and leans on his left elbow. Also, Frank Sinatra "Frank and Nancy" a pretty basic triple portrait sketch on a sepia background. I'm sure I have another Frank one somewhere with a full colour painting by Bernie but I haven't found it yet.
@@gcxred4kat9 Ah, I found it but it's not a Fuchs, but by an imitator. The Title was "September of My Years"
Hey 👋 Charles!
One last comment. All one has to do is look at the art agencies- the artists, and illustrators they represent today. Every one is looking for that edge, and none of them come close- no originality, no creativity, none of the clarity of a Bernie Fuchs. As a 1973 graduate certificate holder of The Famous Artists School, nothing since then is worthy of the great ones whose materials you share.
Incredible resources. Thank you how do I access more information, to find out more about your course. There is only one page on yr website. I want to buy your whole course but feel uncertain about what it actually contains and want to find out more about the course before I spend 199 dollars. Feel like you need to flesh out yr webpage a bit. Has anyone else bought the course?
Where you see the graphics labeled
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4 click
on each of those graphics which will
take you to a page that lists everything
you will be learning for that part that
you clicked on, which as you’ll see
is a lot.
Sorry it wasn’t made clear on my
website. I’ll make a change to
make it clear.
I have a collection of TV covers ,
How did Bernies' friend introduce him to other people?
.
.
"This guy Fuchs."
fun fact fuchs is german and translate to the animal fox