Mel Hunter
Encyclopedia
Milford "Mel" Joseph Hunter 111 (July 27, 1927 – February 20, 2004) was a 20th century American
illustrator
. He enjoyed a successful career as a science fiction
illustrator, producing illustrations for famous science fiction authors such as Isaac Asimov
and Robert A. Heinlein
, as well as a technical and scientific illustrator for clients such as The Pentagon
, Hayden Planetarium
, and the Massachusetts Audubon Society
.
, where he was physically and psychologically abused
by a humorless father
. "He never knew his mother because she was banished from the household by his father when he was only two years old. While he never forgot the abuse, he didn't seem to dwell on it. Instead, he poured himself into his work and career
," said his third wife, Susan Smith-Hunter.
Hunter entered college a year early, at Northwestern University
in Evanston
, Illinois
. After college he held a variety of odd jobs, but finally landed a draftsman job at Northrop Aircraft Corp in California. In 1950, Hunter decided to pursue a career in art and began to teach himself illustration in his spare time.
With a growing understanding of the fields of astronomy
, astronautics
, and aviation
Hunter set out to teach himself book and magazine illustration. He moved to New York City during the early 1950s, and by 1953 he had successfully sold his first color cover to Galaxy Science Fiction
magazine and talked himself into a technical illustrator at Northrop Aircraft where he painted illustrations of advanced aircraft and simulated combat scenarios.
During that time, the most lucrative outlet for space artists was the science-fiction genre. Along with a fertile imagination
, Hunter coupled his art with realism
and technical accuracy. Hunter's whimsical science fiction robots became his signature to thousands of science fiction fans; the skeletal steel robots graced the covers of the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction
well into the 1970s. Hunter's lonely robots were often depicted walking solo through the desolate landscapes of nuclear ruins or alien planets.
Hunter was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Professional Artist
for the years 1960-1962.
As Hunter's science fiction career blossomed, so did his technical and scientific illustrations. Hunter's love of air and space took him from California's desert runways to Florida's seacoast launchpads to illustrate every variety of jet-age aircraft and space-age rocket imaginable—from X-15 to Saturn V.
One of Hunter's best-known books is "The Missilemen", a photo illustrated work published in 1960 by Doubleday. Hunter visited U.S.
rocket and missile
sites during the late 1950s; he took all of the book's black-and-white photographs. It was a unique document, a rare look inside the world of rocket scientists and engineers of the early space age
. The book, long out of print, is enshrined as a part of space
history itself. Another Hunter book, "Strategic Air Command", was also recognized as a pioneering work in photojournalism; it received the Aviation Writers' Association highest honors in 1961.
"Mel launched a career in scientific illustration after he was an established science-fiction illustrator," said Smith-Hunter. "He was very technically accurate and was commissioned to complete 26 paintings of celestial objects for the Hayden Planetarium in New York City."
Hunter's science fiction art quickly led to illustrating hard science and the most advanced aerospace technology of the time. He worked for Northrop Aircraft as a concept illustrator, painting advanced interceptors and drone bombers; all done for Pentagon officials to evaluate when awarding R&D contracts.
Hunter's popularity was literally taking off by the mid 1960s. He created thousands of highly detailed illustrations and paintings for National Geographic, Newsweek, Time-Life Books, and other publications. If astute readers didn't know Hunter by name, they could certainly identify his distinctive style and subjects.
After 17 years of technical and scientific illustration, Hunter moved from New York to Chester, Vermont in 1967. He began creating lithographic prints depicting the natural scenes which surrounded him. The following year, he was commissioned to create a series of more than 130 watercolors of "Birds of the Northeast" by Abercrombie & Fitch Galleries and Massachusetts Audubon Society. By 1970, Hunter signed a contract with World Publishing Co. for a series of 13 ecological books for children, dealing with topics like the beginning of the earth, mankind, plants, birds, mammals and insects.
In 1976, after accidental damage to his limestone lithographic drawing, Hunter began using mylar as a medium for his lithography, and published a controversial photo-illustrated article in the American Artist Magazine entitled "Revolution in Hand-Drawn Lithography". In 1984, Hunter published his seminal hardcover textbook, The New Lithography which details the "Mylar Method", still in wide use today.
, aviation
expert, and amateur astronomer
will be placed aboard a Falcon-1 rocket
and launched into space
. The private launch, coordinated by Space Services Inc. from Vandenberg Air Force Base
in California, was set to launch in 2007.
Finally, launch was scheduled for 3 August 2008 at 03:35 UTC. Details may change as more information becomes available. Current launch details: SpaceX used a Falcon 1 to launch Trailblazer and two CubeSats for the American Air Force and MDA, and for NASA. Launch occurred at Kwajalein Atoll. A Celestis Space burial payload,' Explorers Flight', including the remains of astronaut Gordon Cooper, Star Trek actor James Doohan, and 206 others, including Mel Hunter, was also being flown.
A flight anomaly occurred about the time of separation between the first and second stages, which was planned for 2 minutes and 39 seconds after launch and it seems that the rocket never reached orbit. (Susan Smith-Hunter, from Charles Chafer, Celestis)
Hunter shared the final years of life with his third wife, Rutland, Vermont
native sculptor Susan Smith-Hunter. The couple opened the Smith-Hunter Gallery during the 1980s at their Ferrisburgh home. The gallery closed in 2007 and Smith-Hunter relocated to Brandon Vermont where she continues a smaller gallery and studio. Mel's work is still available here and through www.smithhuntergallery.com.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
illustrator
Illustrator
An Illustrator is a narrative artist who specializes in enhancing writing by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text...
. He enjoyed a successful career as a science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
illustrator, producing illustrations for famous science fiction authors such as Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov was an American author and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, best known for his works of science fiction and for his popular science books. Asimov was one of the most prolific writers of all time, having written or edited more than 500 books and an estimated 90,000...
and Robert A. Heinlein
Robert A. Heinlein
Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...
, as well as a technical and scientific illustrator for clients such as The Pentagon
The Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
, Hayden Planetarium
Hayden Planetarium
The Hayden Planetarium is a public planetarium, part of the Rose Center for Earth and Space of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, currently directed by astrophysicist Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson....
, and the Massachusetts Audubon Society
Massachusetts Audubon Society
The Massachusetts Audubon Society, founded in 1896 by Harriet Hemenway and headquartered in Lincoln, Massachusetts, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to "Protecting the nature of Massachusetts." Mass Audubon is independent of the National Audubon Society, and in fact was founded...
.
Early life
Mel Hunter's life began with a troubled childhood in Oak Park, IllinoisOak Park, Illinois
Oak Park, Illinois is a suburb bordering the west side of the city of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States. It is the twenty-fifth largest municipality in Illinois. Oak Park has easy access to downtown Chicago due to public transportation such as the Chicago 'L' Blue and Green lines,...
, where he was physically and psychologically abused
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...
by a humorless father
Father
A father, Pop, Dad, or Papa, is defined as a male parent of any type of offspring. The adjective "paternal" refers to father, parallel to "maternal" for mother...
. "He never knew his mother because she was banished from the household by his father when he was only two years old. While he never forgot the abuse, he didn't seem to dwell on it. Instead, he poured himself into his work and career
Career
Career is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as a person's "course or progress through life ". It is usually considered to pertain to remunerative work ....
," said his third wife, Susan Smith-Hunter.
Hunter entered college a year early, at Northwestern University
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....
in Evanston
Evanston, Illinois
Evanston is a suburban municipality in Cook County, Illinois 12 miles north of downtown Chicago, bordering Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, and Wilmette to the north, with an estimated population of 74,360 as of 2003. It is one of the North Shore communities that adjoin Lake Michigan...
, Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
. After college he held a variety of odd jobs, but finally landed a draftsman job at Northrop Aircraft Corp in California. In 1950, Hunter decided to pursue a career in art and began to teach himself illustration in his spare time.
Science Fiction Illustration
Astronomy
Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...
, astronautics
Astronautics
Astronautics, and related astronautical engineering, is the theory and practice of navigation beyond the Earth's atmosphere. In other words, it is the science and technology of space flight....
, and aviation
Aviation
Aviation is the design, development, production, operation, and use of aircraft, especially heavier-than-air aircraft. Aviation is derived from avis, the Latin word for bird.-History:...
Hunter set out to teach himself book and magazine illustration. He moved to New York City during the early 1950s, and by 1953 he had successfully sold his first color cover to Galaxy Science Fiction
Galaxy Science Fiction
Galaxy Science Fiction was an American digest-size science fiction magazine, published from 1950 to 1980. It was founded by an Italian company, World Editions, which was looking to break in to the American market. World Editions hired as editor H. L...
magazine and talked himself into a technical illustrator at Northrop Aircraft where he painted illustrations of advanced aircraft and simulated combat scenarios.
During that time, the most lucrative outlet for space artists was the science-fiction genre. Along with a fertile imagination
Imagination
Imagination, also called the faculty of imagining, is the ability of forming mental images, sensations and concepts, in a moment when they are not perceived through sight, hearing or other senses...
, Hunter coupled his art with realism
Realism (visual arts)
Realism in the visual arts is a style that depicts the actuality of what the eyes can see. The term is used in different senses in art history; it may mean the same as illusionism, the representation of subjects with visual mimesis or verisimilitude, or may mean an emphasis on the actuality of...
and technical accuracy. Hunter's whimsical science fiction robots became his signature to thousands of science fiction fans; the skeletal steel robots graced the covers of the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction
The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction is a digest-size American fantasy and science fiction magazine first published in 1949 by Mystery House and then by Fantasy House. Both were subsidiaries of Lawrence Spivak's Mercury Publications, which took over as publisher in 1958. Spilogale, Inc...
well into the 1970s. Hunter's lonely robots were often depicted walking solo through the desolate landscapes of nuclear ruins or alien planets.
Hunter was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Professional Artist
Hugo Award for Best Professional Artist
The Hugo Awards are given every year by the World Science Fiction Society for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year. The award is named after Hugo Gernsback, the founder of the pioneering science fiction magazine Amazing Stories, and was once officially...
for the years 1960-1962.
Technical and Scientific Illustration
One of Hunter's best-known books is "The Missilemen", a photo illustrated work published in 1960 by Doubleday. Hunter visited U.S.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
rocket and missile
Missile
Though a missile may be any thrown or launched object, it colloquially almost always refers to a self-propelled guided weapon system.-Etymology:The word missile comes from the Latin verb mittere, meaning "to send"...
sites during the late 1950s; he took all of the book's black-and-white photographs. It was a unique document, a rare look inside the world of rocket scientists and engineers of the early space age
Space Age
The Space Age is a time period encompassing the activities related to the Space Race, space exploration, space technology, and the cultural developments influenced by these events. The Space Age is generally considered to have begun with Sputnik...
. The book, long out of print, is enshrined as a part of space
Space
Space is the boundless, three-dimensional extent in which objects and events occur and have relative position and direction. Physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless four-dimensional continuum...
history itself. Another Hunter book, "Strategic Air Command", was also recognized as a pioneering work in photojournalism; it received the Aviation Writers' Association highest honors in 1961.
"Mel launched a career in scientific illustration after he was an established science-fiction illustrator," said Smith-Hunter. "He was very technically accurate and was commissioned to complete 26 paintings of celestial objects for the Hayden Planetarium in New York City."
Hunter's science fiction art quickly led to illustrating hard science and the most advanced aerospace technology of the time. He worked for Northrop Aircraft as a concept illustrator, painting advanced interceptors and drone bombers; all done for Pentagon officials to evaluate when awarding R&D contracts.
Hunter's popularity was literally taking off by the mid 1960s. He created thousands of highly detailed illustrations and paintings for National Geographic, Newsweek, Time-Life Books, and other publications. If astute readers didn't know Hunter by name, they could certainly identify his distinctive style and subjects.
Naturalistic Lithography
In 1976, after accidental damage to his limestone lithographic drawing, Hunter began using mylar as a medium for his lithography, and published a controversial photo-illustrated article in the American Artist Magazine entitled "Revolution in Hand-Drawn Lithography". In 1984, Hunter published his seminal hardcover textbook, The New Lithography which details the "Mylar Method", still in wide use today.
Death
Although diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease in the 1990s, Hunter died of bone cancer in February 2004. True to his final wish, the cremated remains of this multi-talented artistArtist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
, aviation
Aviation
Aviation is the design, development, production, operation, and use of aircraft, especially heavier-than-air aircraft. Aviation is derived from avis, the Latin word for bird.-History:...
expert, and amateur astronomer
Astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist who studies celestial bodies such as planets, stars and galaxies.Historically, astronomy was more concerned with the classification and description of phenomena in the sky, while astrophysics attempted to explain these phenomena and the differences between them using...
will be placed aboard a Falcon-1 rocket
Rocket
A rocket is a missile, spacecraft, aircraft or other vehicle which obtains thrust from a rocket engine. In all rockets, the exhaust is formed entirely from propellants carried within the rocket before use. Rocket engines work by action and reaction...
and launched into space
Space
Space is the boundless, three-dimensional extent in which objects and events occur and have relative position and direction. Physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless four-dimensional continuum...
. The private launch, coordinated by Space Services Inc. from Vandenberg Air Force Base
Vandenberg Air Force Base
Vandenberg Air Force Base is a United States Air Force Base, located approximately northwest of Lompoc, California. It is under the jurisdiction of the 30th Space Wing, Air Force Space Command ....
in California, was set to launch in 2007.
Finally, launch was scheduled for 3 August 2008 at 03:35 UTC. Details may change as more information becomes available. Current launch details: SpaceX used a Falcon 1 to launch Trailblazer and two CubeSats for the American Air Force and MDA, and for NASA. Launch occurred at Kwajalein Atoll. A Celestis Space burial payload,' Explorers Flight', including the remains of astronaut Gordon Cooper, Star Trek actor James Doohan, and 206 others, including Mel Hunter, was also being flown.
A flight anomaly occurred about the time of separation between the first and second stages, which was planned for 2 minutes and 39 seconds after launch and it seems that the rocket never reached orbit. (Susan Smith-Hunter, from Charles Chafer, Celestis)
Hunter shared the final years of life with his third wife, Rutland, Vermont
Rutland (town), Vermont
Rutland is a town in Rutland County, Vermont, United States. The population was 4,054 at the 2010 census. Rutland completely surrounds the city of Rutland, which is incorporated separately from the town of Rutland.-History:...
native sculptor Susan Smith-Hunter. The couple opened the Smith-Hunter Gallery during the 1980s at their Ferrisburgh home. The gallery closed in 2007 and Smith-Hunter relocated to Brandon Vermont where she continues a smaller gallery and studio. Mel's work is still available here and through www.smithhuntergallery.com.
External links
- The Smith-Hunter Gallery - The gallery of Mel Hunter and Susan Smith-Hunter.