Artist Profile: Verne Tossey (1920–2002)


Like many of the artists that have been featured on this site, Verne Tossey got his start as a student at the Art Student’s League in New York.  As an illustrator, he’s probably best known for his western covers but he worked in all genres.  I like the energy of Tossey’s covers.  His covers are exciting and realistic at the same time.

A small sampling of Verne Tossey’s work can be found below:

Artist Profile: A.R. Tilburne (1887 — 1965)


The Indiana-born illustrator A.R. Tilburne got a later start than some of his pulp contemporaries.  He was already in his forties and settled down with a family before he sold his first illustrations in 1935.  Before that, he had been an amateur actor, an honorably discharged member of the U.S. Navy, a real estate agent, and a building manager.  But even though he started late, he quickly made his mark with the covers that he did for magazines like Weird Tales and Short Stories.  In 1947, he did his best known pulp work when he painted the cover for H.P. Lovecraft’s The Lurking Fear.  He devoted his later years to painting western scenes.  He died at the age of 77 and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Here is a small sampling of A.R. Tilburne’s work: