We just lost Jack Coggins in January of this year. What a shame... I had no idea he had still been with us, or how incredibly prolific an artist he was.
These illustrations Coggins did for a 1952 children's book called "By Spaceship to the Moon" blew me away when I discovered a worn copy of the book jumbled in a large bin of used books at the Goodwill.
I scanned five of them and sent them out to the then much smaller Today's Inspiration group, reshelved the book and that was that until this morning, when I decided to represent them here as a follow-up to last week's series of Ren Wicks spaceship paintings.
A quick web search for info about the artist turned up something I could never have hoped for: a website detailing Jack Coggins' life and presenting a ton of scans, both of his commercial art and personal paintings!
The site was created by Coggins' family members, David and Alan Coggins and what a loving and worthy tribute it is to an incredibly talented artist.
Go take a look.
Hey- I had that book! "By Space Ship To The Moon," I mean. The edition I had featured the lunar scene on the cover, with the two astronauts in the foreground and that strange arachnoid space ship in the background.
ReplyDeleteAlso had "Rockets, Jets, Guided Missiles, and Space Ships," too. Most likely they're still in my folks' attic somewhere; will have to look for them next time I'm back east.
I had totally forgot about them until I saw the images you posted here. Nice to be reminded that there was somebody besides Chesley Bonestell doing awesome space art.
Thanks for bringing back the memories.
Well, gee, Bob... you're welcome! :-)
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