World of wonder: Walter Wick’s dynamic photographic illustrations at Norman Rockwell Museum
The dynamic images of photographic illustrator Walter Wick can be viewed through Oct. 26 in four galleries at Stockbridge’s Norman Rockwell Museum.
An older generation may not recognize the Miami-based artist’s name, however. He’s best known for the children’s “I Spy” books, begun in 1991. For tots, the pages provide a treasure hunt of images to discover.
Since those early publications, Wick has created numerous works, introducing the curious to the properties of water and light, as well as optical illusions and obsessively detailed visits to Lilliputian buildings and lands.
“I was really taken aback by the intensity with which the readers devour these books,” Wick said during a recent interview.
Indeed. With 45 million books translated into 10 languages to date, his creations range from the simplistic to the visually complex. Wick has an artistic arsenal at play, at times echoing the intricate and inane mechanisms of newspaper cartoonist Rube Goldberg, to the visual paradoxes of M.C. Escher.
Many of his images seem to mysteriously float in the air, and when he has met with youngsters, they’ve had questions as to the technique. Some have reasoned that he simply drops objects from a height and takes “a fast picture.”
“They seem to intuitively know that photographs are based in reality … and these questions are coming from kids that can’t even read,” he said.
Goldberg created foolish, roundabout ways to perform simple functions, sometimes begun with a cat chasing a mouse. On YouTube you can find Wick’s 85-moving-piece “Balloon Popper.” He’s been surprised to find that even very small children can quickly figure out how the action will dramatically conclude.
Raised in Granby, Connecticut, Wick’s parents were supportive of his obsessive creativity. In his dad’s workshop he’d make toys and build skateboards. In his constant outdoor explorations he’d nail together tree houses and forts.
“There was a lot of play that any kid would do,” he said in a 2015 interview, “but I think I was probably more intense about my play.”
At age 9, owning an inexpensive Brownie Hawkeye camera, he began what would become a lifelong interest in photography. Later, he attended Bridgeport’s Paier College of Art to learn landscape photography.
Moving to New York, by the late 1970s he had his own studio and began hustling for commercial assignments.
Among his works were book jackets and magazine covers for periodicals ranging from Newsweek to Psychology Today.
“I resisted a lot of traditional advertising work,” Wick said once during an interview. “(Actually) I didn’t resist it. I didn’t get it.”
If there was an epiphany, it was in realizing that puzzling, gravity-defying photos would set him apart as a special effects photographic illustrator.
Serendipitously, while perusing a magazine rack at a subway station, he discovered “Games” magazine. Now known as “The World of Puzzles,” the monthly challenges young readers with crosswords, contests and visual curiosities.
Wick sent a photograph to the editors of a geometrical mirror wherein objects didn’t appear as they should. This began a 10-year relationship wherein Wick frequently contributed paradoxical images for the cover, including an impossible M.C. Escher doghouse.
This playfulness caught the eye of the late Jean Marzollo, then an editor of “Let’s Find Out,” a magazine for kindergartners.
She asked him to create two-page posters of everyday objects. A particular light box display of fasteners sparked interest among Scholastic publication editors.
This ordinary placement of zippers, thumbtacks, hair barrettes and paperclips somehow conjured up the extraordinary, and a Scholastic series of “I Spy” books began. With Marzollo providing words and rhymes and Wick creating images, the books succeeded meteorically.
This breakthrough led to the more complex “Can You See What I See?” series and followed with books studying the qualities of light and water.
In the 1997 book “A Drop of Water” you learn that sleet, when magnified, often is not showroom gorgeous.
The designs of snowflakes, however, are astounding. To capture them on film Wick studied the techniques of Jericho, Vermont’s most famous resident, Wilson “Snowflake” Bentley. He learned that the creator of some 5,000 black and white studies of the ephemeral crystals used a feather to transport them to his camera.
Wick learned the technique, as well as other tricks with wires, light and shadow to create mesmerizing images.
“I’m always testing the audience,” Wick said once in an interview. “I’m always afraid they’re going to walk away from my picture. So I’m trying to glue them to it.”
During a press reception, with Wick absent while vacationing near the canals of Venice, we walked through the galleries with Randy Gilman. For the past 20 years the sculptor has been the lead model maker for Wick’s storybooks.
When asked to describe Wick’s temperament, Gilman said that “he’s just an inventive person. He has a pretty smooth personality.” He added: “He’s a sophisticated child.”
When Gilman first saw the photographer’s studio his assistants were imaginatively creating a colorful, futuristic city out of plain, lowly cardboard. He was gobsmacked. “I am so screwed,” was his immediate thought.
The sculptor explained the tedious detail required to bring these miniature sets to life. There are preliminary sketches and a consideration at what ratio, inches to feet, the models are to be built. Cardboard mockups are created prior to the standing set, constructed in foam core, an easily cut lightweight product.
So that no one loses their mind creating monotonously myriad tiles for a roof, that item comes from retail dollhouse suppliers. The model sets can take two months or more to build.
Lighting is absolutely critical for creating mood and depth.
“Walter is known for picking the most difficult shot to do,” Gilman said. “If he can get that one done, then he knows he has the book.”
There is detail upon detail. For the creation of “On A Scary Scary Street,” composed of a miniature European village, there is illumination coming from custom-made windows. A tiny rubbish barrel holds even more minute trash held by a dwarf Hefty bag.
Conjuring up the 16th century tale of “Puss in Boots,” you view a study in forced perspective, as the landscape is just 3 feet high and 5 feet in depth.
Gilman noted that he had to make adjustments in realizing that two-dimensional photography did not require figures or backdrops to be complete.
The feline is perky and in the blush of good health when viewed from a rear angle.
If viewed from the front, however, as Gilman noted, the cat resembles “a traffic accident.”
The exhibit features oversized color photographs of Wick’s work, models and his early black and white images, as well as a video interview and an interactive program detailing his career. On the lower floor, outside the Stockbridge Room, alongside a fraction of the more than 5,000 photographic studies that Norman Rockwell made prior to painting, there are more Wick images.
What fools the eye is in figuring the size of a Toyland train until you notice the dimensions of a jumping jack nearby.
“When I did the books I made them as best I could,” Wick said in the 2015 interview. “I made them to last as long as possible. I wanted them to be forever books.”
“I Spy! Walter Wick’s Hidden Wonders” continues through Oct. 26. “Artists of the Famous Cartoonists Course” through July. Illustrations from the Edison Mazda collection through January. Hours: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Closed Wednesdays. Admission: Adults $25; Ages 18 and under, free. For more information: nrm.org
Daily Hampshire Gazette
