The People Behind VHS Cover Art

The last time I discussed VHS cover art, I had wanted to include a video featuring artwork by a British artist. As I was unable to remember his name, I was unable to find, let alone include, it. Thankfully, diligent searching has paid off and I finally remembered his name: Graham Humphreys. British readers will no doubt remember Mr. Humphreys’ work and how it got caught up in the infamous “Video Nasties” controversy. As for the video, it’s a labor of love put together by one paintnothing:

After the excitement from rediscovering the video faded, I got to thinking about the identities of other artists whose works graced the shelves of countless video stores in the good old days. Who were they? Thankfully, Google was able to shed some light on the matter. This interview was of great help, as was this interview with Corey Wolfe.

But let’s not forget movie poster artwork, the ancestor of home video cover art. Both old cover art and posters are loved by horror fans and have mostly lapsed into Photoshopped images of actors and actresses in the film instead of using artwork, thanks to things like contracts and the perception that the general public prefers pictures to drawn images. One of the best known poster artists is Drew Struzen, who went from doing posters for b-movies to creating the iconic artwork for many classic films of the 80’s. Wikipedia has both a fascinating article on film posters and an entire category devoted to movie poster artists, with Reynold Brown standing out as one of my favorites. Another favorite of mine, Neal Adams, sadly didn’t make the list but is still worthy of note. This section of his website details all of his work on posters and newspaper ads and includes films like Grizzly and Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors.

Finally, Google Books offers these previews of some Heritage Signature Vintage Movie Poster auction guides will provide tons of poster art and lobby cards from varios horror and sci-fi films from days gone by. Enjoy!

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