Tilley Watch Online, The Week of April 27–May 1, 2026

An end of the week listing of New Yorker artists whose work has appeared on newyorker.com features

Daily Cartoon: Lynn Hsu, Enrico Pinto, (the duo of) Sophie Lucido Johnson and Sammi Skolmoski, Sarah Kempa, Hilary Campbell. See them here (in a slideshow).

Barry Blitt’s Kvetchbook: “Charles And Donald See Eye To Eye”

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Pomp And Circumstance: A slideshow of graduation cartoons (the below, from the great Warren Miller,* is just one of many in this online special feature.

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*Warren Miller’s A-Z Entry:

Warren Miller (photo by Liza Donnelly, NYC, Sept. 1997) Born 1936, Chicago, Ill. The following biographical information comes from The Phoenix Gallery site which hosted a group exhibit of NYer cartoonists work (Lorenz, Harris, Modell, and Miller) in 2007: “Warren Miller studied commercial and fine art at the American Academy of Art, Chicago. He started selling cartoons to Playboy and The New Yorker in 1961 and moved to New York City later that year. Miller’s work has also appeared in Esquire, Punch, Rolling Stone, Audubon, Harvard Business Review, Barrons, Time, Newsweek, The New York Times, and the London Sunday Times. Mr. Miller is a painter and a sculptor as well. He has exhibited his work in a number of shows in the New York area and in the Midwest.” Key collections: All Thumbs (Bobbs-Merrill,1967); Prince and Mrs. Charming (Bobbs-Merril, 1970). New Yorker work: 1959 -.

Polly Lou Adams Guests On The Latest Cartoon Caption Contest Podcast

Polly Lou Adams (upper left in the photo), who began contributing to The New Yorker in June of 2025, joins two of four CCCP co-hosts, Paul Nesja (upper right) and Nicole Chrolavicius. It’s Episode #249 for those keeping track. Listen here. 

Visit Polly Lou Adams website here. ___________________________________________________________________

A New Yorker State Of Mind Digs Into The Issue Of April 25, 1936

A New Yorker State of Mind: Reading Every Issue of The New Yorker Magazine continues its good work. 

Read it here. 

Cover by Rea Irvin: Born, San Francisco, 1881; died in the Virgin Islands,1972. Irvin was the cover artist for the New Yorker’s first issue, February 21, 1925. He was the magazine’s first art and only art supervisor (some refer to him as its first art editor) holding the position from 1925 until 1939 when James Geraghty assumed the title of art editor. Irvin then became art director and remained in that position until William Shawn officially succeeded Harold Ross in early 1952. Irvin’s last original work for the magazine was the magazine’s cover of July 12, 1958. The February 21, 1925 Eustace Tilley cover had been reproduced every year on the magazine’s anniversary until 1994, when R. Crumb’s Tilley-inspired cover appeared. Tilley has since reappeared, with other artists substituting from time-to-time. Number of New Yorker covers (not including the repeat appearances of the first cover every anniversary up to 1991): 179. Number of cartoons contributed: 261. 

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Article Of Interest…Guy Richards Smit

From The Creative Independent, April 30, 2026, Mr. Smit’s  conversation with Brandon Stosay. 

Guy Richards Smit began contributing to The New Yorker in 2022.

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Live Interview Of Interest: Liza Donnelly On Radio Free Rhinecliff

Liza Donnelly, long-time New Yorker contributor, and filmmaker (Women Laughing) will be live today at 5 on Radio Free Rhinecliff. Listen here.  

Photo: Eric Korenman

“His People Simply Happen”

In a 1989 collection, Conversations With James Thurber (University Press of Mississippi) edited by Thomas Fensch, there’s a terrif article, “Melancholy Doodler,” by Arthur Millier (it originally appeared in The Los Angeles Times Sunday Magazine, July 2, 1939). Thurber was forty-four at the time, and in the last year of the best decade of his life, drawings-wise. His eyesight, by May of ’39, had already worsened  to the point of his “struggling to type, read, and draw.”

The article makes no mention of Thurber’s eyesight or his struggles — it rolls along as if all’s well in Thurberland. Here are just a few quotes from the piece (I’d run the whole thing, but don’t want to get into a copyright muddle).

Thurber speaking to Millier:

“You are probably the only person in America who knows I write.” he said bitterly. “They all say: ‘Oh yes, Thurber?–the guy makes those crazy drawings?'”

“i’m not an artist. I’m a painstaking writer who doodles for relaxation. But it’s those doodles they go for…They’ve even labeled me a Dadiast and a surrealist…”

“I almost never have a piece of writing turned down [by The New Yorker]. They print them all — but who reads them? Whereas my drawings — the things people know me for — are often turned down.”

“Captions can make a drawing. Some of my drawings lie around the office for years — waiting for an inspired line.”

Finally, here’s Millier talking about Thurber’s drawings:

“When Thurber begins a drawing of these curious yet strangely familiar people, he rarely knows what they will look like or do. He just lets his hand move with a pencil in it. His people simply happen…”

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–The undated drawing above can be found at Vassar’s Francis Lehman Loeb Art Center.  ________________

James Thurber’s A-Z Entry:

James Thurber Born, Columbus, Ohio, December 8, 1894. Died 1961, New York City. New Yorker work: 1927 -1961, with several pieces run posthumously. According to the New Yorker’s legendary editor, William Shawn, “In the early days, a small company of writers, artists, and editors — E.B. White, James Thurber, Peter Arno, and Katharine White among them — did more to make the magazine what it is than can be measured.”

Key cartoon collection: The Seal in the Bedroom and Other Predicaments (Harper & Bros., 1932). Key anthology (writings & drawings): The Thurber Carnival (Harper & Row, 1945). There have been a number of Thurber biographies. Burton Bernstein’s Thurber (Dodd, Mead, 1975) and Harrison Kinney’s James Thurber: His Life and Times (Henry Holt & Co., 1995) are essential. Website

National Cartoonists Society Announces Finalists

Photos, top row: Joe Dator, Amy Hwang, Tom Toro; middle row: Jason Chatfield, Tom Chitty; bottom row: Liniers, Garry Trudeau

A number of New Yorker contributors are finalists for this years NCS awards. Joe Dator, Amy Hwang, and Tom Toro are the finalists in the single panel group. Jason Chatfield is one of three finalists for Book Illustration. Tom Chitty is one of the three finalists in the Book and Magazine Illustration category. Liniers and Garry Trudeau are among the Newspaper Strip finalists.

The full slate of nominees for the 2026 awards, and more info on the awards themselves can be found here.

Congrats to all!

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Liza Donnelly In Conversation With Andy Borowitz Today, Live At 3 (EST). 

Andy Borowitz, of the popular Borowitz Report will be a guest on long-time New Yorker contributor (and now filmmaker) Liza Donnelly’s Substack, Seeing Things, today at 3 (EST).

Liza Donnelly’s website.

More about Andy Borowitz.

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Hilary Campbell’s Cartoon Strips

Hilary Campbell has announced the first of a new monthly show at the Greenpoint Comedy Club.This first one includes her fellow New Yorker contributor, Emily Flake.

Exhibit Of Interest: Mick Stevens to Show Work On Martha’s Vineyard 

Mick Stevens, who began contributing to The New Yorker in December of 1979, tells the Spill that:

“There’s a show of a dozen or so of my older original New Yorker drawings here at The Martha’s Vineyard Playhouse in Vineyard Haven. The show will run for the entire month of May. The artist will be lurking there from time to time.”

Here’s a personal fave New Yorker drawing by Mr. Stevens (not sure this will be included in the exhibit) :

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Some Stevens Cartoon Collections…

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A New Yorker State Of Mind Looks At The Issue Of April 18, 1936

Such fun New Yorker time traveling via the weekly New Yorker State of Mind posts.

This week: the issue of April 18, 1936.

Read it here!

Cover by the one-and-only Rea Irvin.

The Monday Tilley Watch takes a glancing look at the art and artists of the latest issue of The New Yorker

The Cartoonists and Cartoons

Thirteen cartoons, thirteen cartoonists. No newbies. No duos, that we know of. The longest active contributing cartoonist in the issue is this cartoonist (my drawing of a fife-playing bear appears on the Cartoon Caption Contest page with this week’s winning caption).

This week’s cartoons (in a slideshow)

This week’s Cartoon Caption Contest (Robert Leighton provides the latest contest drawing).

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The Rea Irvin Talk Watch

Way back in 2017, Rea Irvin’s 92 year old Talk design (shown here) was yanked and replaced by…I can’t even believe I’m writing this: a redrawn version by a contemporary illustrator. The Spill continues to hope that Mr. Irvin’s work returns. Read more here.

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Rea Irvin’s A-Z Entry:

Rea Irvin (pictured above. Self portrait above from Meet the Artist) Born, San Francisco, 1881; died in the Virgin Islands,1972. Irvin was the cover artist for the New Yorker’s first issue, February 21, 1925. He was the magazine’s first art and only art supervisor (some refer to him as its first art editor) holding the position from 1925 until 1939 when James Geraghty assumed the title of art editor. Irvin then became art director and remained in that position until William Shawn officially succeeded Harold Ross in early 1952. Irvin’s last original work for the magazine was the magazine’s cover of July 12, 1958. The February 21, 1925 Eustace Tilley cover had been reproduced every year on the magazine’s anniversary until 1994, when R. Crumb’s Tilley-inspired cover appeared. Tilley has since reappeared, with other artists substituting from time-to-time. Number of New Yorker covers (not including the repeat appearances of the first cover every anniversary up to 1991): 179. Number of cartoons contributed: 261.

A New Yorker State Of Mind Digs Into The Issue Of April 11, 1936

A New Yorker State Of Mind: Reading Every Issue Of The New Yorker: always fun, always interesting reading.

This week: the issue of April 11, 1936. Read it here. 

Cover by Helen Hokinson.

Her A-Z Entry:

Helen Hokinson (above) Born, Illinois,1893; died, Washington, D.C., 1949. New Yorker work: 1925 -1949, with some work published posthumously. All of Hokinson’s collections are wonderful, but here are two favorites. Her first collection: So You’re Going To Buy A Book! (Minton, Balch & Co, 1931) and what was billed as “the final Hokinson collection”: The Hokinson Festival (Dutton & Co., 1956). According to a New Yorker document produced during Harold Ross’s editorship (1925-1951) rating their artists, Ms. Hokinson and Peter Arno occupied a special category unto themselves above all others.

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Al Frueh’s Terrif Love Letter

In 1913, long before Al Frueh (pronounced “free”) became a fixture at The New Yorker, he designed the above letter for his wife. Read all about it here.

Mr Frueh was a cover artist, as well as a cartoonist, contributing 201 cartoons during his 34 years at the magazine. Of note: he had the very first cartoon in the very first issue of The New Yorker. His one-and-only New Yorker cover, dated February 28, 1925, was the magazine’s second:

He will most likely be remembered for his theater drawings (accompanying the magazine’s theater reviews):

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Tilley Watch Online, April 20 – 24, 2026

Daily Cartoon: Ben Schwartz, Harriet Burbeck, Kyle Bravo, Felipe Galindo (bonus drawing), Tom Toro, Maggie Larson.

Barry Blitt’s Kvetchbook: “Happy Earth Day (To Those Who Celebrate)”

Simon Fieldhouse’s Latest 3D Portrait Sculpture: Peter Arno

Next up in artist Simon Fieldhouse‘s New Yorker series: Peter Arno. See the sculpture in various settings here.

And here are his other New Yorker 3D sculptures:

Eustace Tilley

Harold Ross

Saul Steinberg

To see all of his 3D sculptures, go here.

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Frank Cotham Returns As Guest On Cartoon Caption Contest Podcast

Frank Cotham, who began contributing to The New Yorker in 1993, returns to the CCCP in this episode (#248 for those keeping track). Listen here.

photo: clockwise, from top left…Frank Cotham, then the co-hosts Paul  Nesja, Vin Coca, Nicole Chrolavicius, Beth Lawler. 

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Paul Karasik Presents…

From The Vineyard Gazette, April 23, 2026, “Film Noir Takes Center Stage” — this piece on films and Mr. Karasik, who began contributing to The New Yorker  in 1999.  Visit his website here.

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New Addition(s) To The Spill Library

With the arrival this week of the Armed Services edition of Thurber’s masterpiece, My Life And Hard Times, the Spill library has moved closer to a completing the Thurber Armed Services editions. Just The Thurber Carnival and Is Sex Necessary remain. All in good time! (I’m in no hurry).

Read more about the Armed Services editions here.

below: the other Thurber titles in the Spill library

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Also this week

Some time back I posted the above photo of the well-used (tattered?) dust jacket covering my copy of Burton Bernstein’s Thurber: A Biography. I bought this copy in 1975, the year it was published, when I was in my last year of college, diving deep into The New Yorker‘s history. I’ve read Mr. Bernstein’s book through and through, again and again (and it shows). Each time the book comes off the shelf I imagine the jacket loses a small piece or two (I’ve been patching it for years).

Strolling through the internet the other day I was so pleased to see a copy of Mr. Bernstein’s book in near new condition (price paid: $3.85). My 51 year old copy can now take it easy; from now on this “new” one will do the heavy lifting.

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Attempted Bloggery On A Recently Auctioned Thurber Original 

A Spill fave site, Attempted Bloggery, is all over the recently auctioned Thurber original shown above. Read it here!

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James Thurber’s A-Z Entry

James Thurber Born, Columbus, Ohio, December 8, 1894. Died 1961, New York City. New Yorker work: 1927 -1961, with several pieces run posthumously. According to the New Yorker’s legendary editor, William Shawn, “In the early days, a small company of writers, artists, and editors — E.B. White, James Thurber, Peter Arno, and Katharine White among them — did more to make the magazine what it is than can be measured.”

Key cartoon collection: The Seal in the Bedroom and Other Predicaments (Harper & Bros., 1932). Key anthology (writings & drawings): The Thurber Carnival (Harper & Row, 1945). There have been a number of Thurber biographies. Burton Bernstein’s Thurber (Dodd, Mead, 1975) and Harrison Kinney’s James Thurber: His Life and Times (Henry Holt & Co., 1995) are essential. Website