Robert Fawcett

Born 1903 – 1967

Education Slade School of Art in London

His father, an amateur artist, encouraged Robert\'s interest in art. While in Canada, he was apprenticed to an engraver. He attended the Slade School of Art in London, then returned to the United States to pursue a career in fine arts, although he had to work as a commercial artist to support himself. He soon became disenchanted with the poor pay and political infighting of the fine arts world and decided to commit himself to commercial art, where he was successful. He was the author of On The Art Of Drawing.

Returning to New York, Fawcett did only enough commercial work to keep himself alive, while working furiously at his easel paintings. Within two years he was given a one-man show, and two-thirds of his paintings sold. However, he became disillusioned with the culture of the gallery world, feeling that creating illustrations was a more honest way to sell art. He determined that his easel paintings would be given to friends or saved for his own enjoyment. Beginning in 1944, he embarked on a long career supplying story illustrations to The Saturday Evening Post, among other magazines. In later years, he turned to reportorial assignments, including a piece on Oxford, Mississippi, for Look magazine.

Fawcett was called “the illustrator’s illustrator,” because it took a trained eye to appreciate the excellence of the drawing and the masterful use of color that are combined in his technique. However, he never lost sight of his audience – the reading public. He felt that illustrators have a great responsibility because, “We represent the only view of art, of beauty, to millions of people. If we do less than our best, we cheat them.”

As he was slightly color blind, Fawcett did not excel as a painter, but he was an excellent draftsman and designer, with a strong eye for detail. He produced story illustrations and full-page ads that appeared in The Saturday Evening Post, Collier\'s, Holiday, and Cosmopolitan bringing a superb sense of composition to his advertisement work. His work for Collier\'s magazine included detailed illustrations accompanying a series of Sherlock Holmes stories. He later produced documentary-type illustrations for Look. In 1948, Fawcett was recruited by Albert Dorne to be one of the founding artists at the Famous Artists School.

Awards

National Academy of Design as an Associate Academician 1964

Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame 1967

Online gallery: http://www.artnet.com/artists/robert-fawcett/

Robert Fawcett History of American Illustration