Thread for Crockett Johnson, communist cartoonist, creator of Harold and the Purple Crayon and Barnaby, painter of geometry

I mostly wanted to post somewhere that I just read about Crockett Johnson's mathematical paintings, which are totally fascinating imo. But that led me to realize there was no Crockett Johnson thread to post that on, so here it is.

Barnaby is amazing art and artifact. Johnson's father was from the Shetland Islands, his mother was German, he grew up in immigrant New York in the early 1900s. He ended up creating a strip about an Irish fairy godfather who smoked cigars, produced initially for a left-wing newspaper.

Anyway, after all of that he apparently spent 10 years making paintings based on geometric formulas. Interesting guy!

[Removed Illegal Image]

https://philnel.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Crockett_Johnson_squared_circle.jpeg

Oops, I'll try the images again.

https://locustmoon.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/barnaby1.jpg

https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/08/11/multimedia/11Harold-kids3-zcfm/11Harold-kids3-zcfm-articleLarge.jpg

Mathematical paintings: https://www.si.edu/spotlight/mathematical-paintings-of-crockett-johnson

Thanks, I dig those math paintings.
Pretty cool that its the same guy who did H&TPC...

those are gorgeous - had someone shown those to me i would've never thought it was from him!

the final volume of Barnaby came out a few weeks ago: https://www.fantagraphics.com/products/barnaby-volume-five

I had no idea about these paintings, and they're fantastic, thanks tipsy!

really want to get vols 3-5 of Barnaby, but woof they are pricey (at least in Canada)

free sticker tho

Yeah I have the first two of those Barnaby books, I haven't bought the rest.

I think vol 3 is where some of the strips are produced by a different writer/artist, but Johnson returned to the strip after about a year.

I love Barnaby, and those paintings are really cool! I had no idea they existed. I kind of want to make one of them into a quilt.