SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN called it “[the] famous poster by Gerry Mooney”. It’s been referenced everywhere from Encyclopedia Britannica to The Simpsons. I’ve sold over 5,000, to teachers, lawyers, pilots and even regular people. A parole officer in Florida ordered six for his clients.
As work proceeds at what sometimes seems like a glacial pace, I would like to present these four recently-completed small illustrations. I’ve strived to provide some context for each with excerpts from the book.
It may seem like there are some spoilers here, but BLEAK HOUSE is so jam-packed with catastrophic plot twists that you’ll forget all about these once you’re reading the book!
Here, Lord Dedlock’s flighty cousin Volumnia, a fairly minor character, stumbles upon his prostrate body in the dark.
The Dedlock town house changes not externally, and hours pass before its exalted dullness is disturbed within. But Volumnia the fair, being subject to the prevalent complaint of boredom and finding that disorder attacking her spirits with some virulence, ventures at length to repair to the library for change of scene. Her gentle tapping at the door producing no response, she opens it and peeps in; seeing no one there, takes possession.
In researching and reading about the art and business of woodcut illustration in the 19th Century, it is almost inevitable to end up with Gustave Doré. More than a master draftsman or illustrator, he possessed a practically supernatural ability to simply draw. He was recognized as a prodigy at age five, was carving in stone at twelve, and by fifteen he was supporting his family by drawing caricatures for French magazine Le journal pour rire.
Although Dickens and Doré never met as far as I can determine, their lifespans overlapped, Dickens being born in 1812 and Doré in 1832. And while Dickens labored in the world of British popular fiction and monthly magazines, the French Doré was producing high-quality illustrated art volumes of what we would call “The Great Books”, e.g., Voltaire, Rabelais, Cervantes, the Bible, Paradise Lost, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, and many, many others, much of it for a British audience.
On October 3, I got an email from Ellen Gamerman, an arts writer for the Wall Street Journal. Elon Musk was in the process of being sued by Twitter for backing out of his offer to purchase the social media giant. No news there, right? So I get this email:
Hi Gerry,
I’m an arts writer with the WSJ, and I’m working on a story about Bleak House and the chancery court, pegged to the start of Elon Musk’s trial in a (very different) chancery court. I hoped to talk with you because I saw on the Dickens Society site that you were interested in illustrating that novel. It would be great to hear your thoughts about the visuals in Dickens’s chancery court. If you’re free, I’m on a tight deadline and hoped to reach you today if possible, or tomorrow. Thank you!
Best,
Ellen
It has been said that Inspector Bucket, the police detective in BLEAK HOUSE, was the very first fictional detective, pre-dating Sherlock Holmes among others. I don’t know about that, but I do love this great Dickens character!
It’s tempting to compare him to others of the genre, and I often think of Columbo for some reason, but that’s not even close. Bucket is not rumpled and never feigns confusion, but the attribute they share is a totally disarming likability. Bucket’s greatest skill as an investigator is instantly being everyone’s best friend and confidante. He can speak to little children, Lords and Ladies, or street sweepers, and within a sentence or two bond with them like an old friend.
Continue reading “Inspector Bucket”You may know that I was extremely honored earlier this year to be asked to write a blog post for the prestigious Dickens Society in London. It was well-received and there is a standing invitation to write more for them in the future.
The Dickens Society is an academic group dedicated to exploring all facets of Charles Dickens’s* life and work, but it is not an exclusive club at all. In fact I was surprised to learn how easy it is to join: by subscribing to their journal The Dickens Quarterly, you are automatically enrolled as a member.
It is The Dickens Quarterly that I would like to write about. I’ve been a member for a year now, and I am by no means either a Dickens completist, or an academic of any kind. Some of the material is a little over my head, but I’m comfortable with that. What is great is the breadth of subject matter, and how it makes you think differently not only about Dickens but also about nineteenth-century fiction, Victorian England, and much more.
Continue reading “Charles Dickens and Race”As an artist I’m always looking for ways to keep my skills sharp, and regular life-drawing classes are a must if you’re drawing the human figure. Nude models, of every size, shape and age, are the rule, but let’s face it, in the practice of our art we’re almost never drawing naked people, we’re drawing people with clothes on.
Continue reading “Online Drawing Class“As you probably know, the internets contain everything known to humankind, and Charles Dickens is no exception. In my research over the years on this particular project, I keep finding websites and blogs devoted to the man and his works, and I would like to share just a few that I find myself visiting over and over.
I’m not opining on any of them, as they each have their strengths and they are all worth visiting. Some, like the Charles Dickens Museum, are websites for particular places in the real world, while others are compendiums in and of themselves. For the most part I’ve picked up text from their “About” pages, and some I have invited to submit a paragraph or two to expand on their mission statements.
Continue reading “iDickens”So in doing magazine and book illustration for a few decades, I picked up a couple of technical terms. For example, an illustration is called an “illo”, a sketch is called a “ruff”, and a deadline is called a “#!!@! deadline”.
Illos done for print are termed by their size, and from biggest to smallest are called a spread, full-page, half-page, quarter page, and spot. Spots are fun because they are usually simple, a quick visual read, and they don’t necessarily have to carry as much narrative weight as a full-page does.
Continue reading ““Spot Illos””Research sketching is one of the most important steps in doing any historical illustration work, and that requires good reference materials. In the years B.C. (Before Computers), any illustrator worth his or her salt had a “morgue”, or a collection of photos filed in boxes or file cabinets, usually alphabetically, of any or all things in creation because you never knew what you would be called on to draw.
My four-drawer file cabinet is long gone, but I saved various reference books, including a couple of books of old wood engravings. For the most part pre-dating photography, these books are amazing for the sheer breadth of their content.
Continue reading “Research Sketching – Buildings”
Gerry Mooney Illustrating Dickens 