Biography from AskART:
| Described as the "unknown creative granddaddy" of atomic age record-album covers with "jagged, volatile images", Jim Flora did work in the 1940s and 1950s that remains a major influence on today's CD cover artists. Flora worked for Columbia and RCE where his characteristic illustrations were described by Ben Sisario in "The New York Times" as "grotesque yet comic Picasso-like figures rendered in a cartoonish, two-dimensional panic. They set a standard of fresh design, bringing Surrealism and geometric abstractions reminiscent of those of Stuart Davis to commercial art and were widely imitated at the time. But by the 60's, with the arrival of rock n' roll and a new aestheic, Flora's covers ended up in the dustbin of discarded pop culture."
Flora's home town was Rowayton, Connecticut where he continued to live until his death in 1998 at age 84. As an innovative illustrator, he became largely forgotten, until a group of younger artists, realizing his talent sought him out towards the end of his life and began to collect his work and solicit his wisdom. Irwin Chusid was one of these fans, and, using material given to him by Flora before his death, he wrote a book titled "The Mischievous Art of Jim Flora", published in 2004.
Of Flora's lasting influence, Michael Bartolos, a San Francisco-based illustrator who was among the first persons to seek out the elderly Flora, said: "He's a cultural asset. His work lends a lot of flavor and joy to whatever he was working on, and he paved the way for that zaniness in illustration that still exists today".
Source:
Ben Sisario, 'The Arts', "The New York Times", December 30, 2004, B1.
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