Barry Blitt, Invisible Man

While reading a Frank Rich op-ed in the New York Times over the weekend about the billionaire Koch brothers who've been funding the Tea Party movement, I fell in love with the accompanying illustration.


Not surprisingly, it was by Barry Blitt.

Best known to the public for the controversial pre-election New Yorker cover that depicted the Obamas as radical fist-bumpers, Blitt is an illustrator who gets a lot of work published. Despite that, there's very little easy-to-find information about him on the interweb... no Wikipedia page, no complete bio, nothing.

All I can find out is that he's Canadian (from near Montreal) and lives in Connecticut. No idea how old he is or where -- or whether -- he went to art school. I believe the New Yorker covers on his portfolio website go back to 1994, so that gives some idea that he's not 23, I guess.

Here are a few of his less-political pieces that I particularly liked.


This makes me think of Pete Hautmann's book Rash, which takes place in a future America where high schoolers running track have to wear helmets and padding.


A brilliant swipe at the baby-acquiring classes.

In this economy, everyone needs something to aspire toward.


An infinite number of monkeys might be able to write Hamlet, but they could never draw like Barry Blitt.