Bruce McCall, the artist behind the cover for the May 15, 2023, issue, died on May 5th, at the age of eighty-seven. McCall, who insisted upon chewing his beloved Groucho Marx cigars long after a taste for tobacco stopped being even remotely acceptable, was a dear friend and a poet at heart. His artistic sensibility was formed far beyond the strictures of art school, first in the stark and frigid landscape of Ontario, then in the stark and frigid world of Madison Avenue advertising. His work as an ad man lent him an extraordinary drawing fluency and speed, and a knack for copywriting—his paintings are often filled with a droll humor splayed across billboards and signs. Ardor for the shining mirage of Detroit, Michigan—on the other side of Lake St. Clair—never left his heart. He loved cars, and drove everywhere in congested Manhattan traffic long after most everyone else had opted for public transportation.
McCall contributed more than eighty covers (this is his eighty-third) and about as many Shouts & Murmurs columns. “Bruce was a genius,” the New Yorker editor Susan Morrison said. “He alchemized his misanthropy into joyously anarchic paintings and drawings and pieces of writing. He often felt (needlessly) that he got short shrift as a writer, but I was always excited when my inbox contained a message from him, which would generally begin: ‘Please read this submission and laugh your goddamn head off.’ He was a first-class pal. For a curmudgeon, he was always happy to see you.”
I asked more of McCall’s friends and colleagues what they’ll remember and treasure about him and his work:
“Bruce is best-known for his visual world, the surrealist World’s Fair futurism, his affection for a past that never was, the sheer lunacy, but that is only part of his brilliance. Bruce was also a brilliant writer, both a sharp and hilarious satirist and a wintry memoirist. He was a huge talent and such an important and protean presence in our pages.”—David Remnick
“When I finally met Bruce McCall, I felt the thrill that other people feel when meeting Springsteen.”—Steve Martin
“They say you never should meet your idols because they can only disappoint. Bruce McCall, whom I’d idolized since middle school when I discovered his work in National Lampoon, proved this wrong. His work—hilarious, gorgeous, and sublime—will live on. His friendship is irreplaceable.”—Andy Borowitz
And, with a reference to one of McCall’s most memorable books, Zany Afternoons, published in 1982:
“I’ll miss Bruce terribly. His crusty and deadpan manner belied the zany afternoons he visualized for us all. He offered us an impeccably rendered retro future, cynical and absurd, but somehow a happier dystopia than the one we face without him.”—Art Spiegelman
See below for some of McCall’s inimitable and iconic covers:
“Have a Nice Day,” March 7, 1994.
“King Kong Call,” January 23, 1995.
“Lost Times Square,” May 31, 1999.
“Open Season,” November 7, 2011.
Find Bruce McCall’s covers, cartoons, and more at the Condé Nast Store.
“Steamers,” November 21, 1994
“Polar Bears on Fifth Avenue,” January 13, 2014
“The Cart Before the Horses,” April 28, 2014
Sourse: newyorker.com
