Out now! My profile of illustrator David Plunkert in Issue 29 of 3×3 Magazine. Here is an excerpt:
What David refers to as his Block-Style are illustrations that hew to the Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Robots school of drawing: forms are reductive, flat, typically geometric, and in limited color palettes that suggest cheaply printed two- or three-color ephemera. David cites Pablo Picasso’s Cubist period and contemporary illustrators Brian Cronin and Phillippé Weisbecker as points of reference, as well as the minimalist, often primitive ethos of early twentieth century avant-garde toys. “Toys that Italian Futurist Fortunato Depero would have played with,” he explains.
That said, I would hazard a guess that the photomechanical aesthetic of ‘60s comics has seeped into David’s Block-Style via prepubescent osmosis. These illustrations are almost fetishistic in their evocation of the materiality of ink on paper: misaligned or overprinted elements, uneven textures, contaminated colors—as if someone failed to clean the press after the last print run—and imperfectly-formed Ben-Day dots.
Read the entire profile (as well as prior articles) under Design is Play Articles. [MF]