Rick Meyerowitz
His Short, Easy-to-Read Biography

Rick Meyerowitz grew up in The Bronx, and although Ogden Nash famously wrote “The Bronx? No thonx!” it was a great and vibrant place to survive a childhood. In the 1960’s Rick studied literature and fine arts at Boston University. He returned to New York, found a loft in Chinatown that cost him $35 a month, (possibly the most memorable fact you will read here) and began life as working illustrator.

Rick has done thousands of illustrations for advertising agencies and magazines. One reviewer of Rick’s art wrote, “He does illustrations only a sourpuss wouldn’t appreciate.”

Rick was the most prolific contributor of illustrated articles for the once hilarious, now hilariously defunct National Lampoon Magazine. He wrote and drew for the magazine for 15 years. He painted the poster for their movie Animal House, and created the Lampoon’s trademark visual, The Mona Gorilla, which some say is the best Mona Lisa parody ever.

His own books include Nose Masks, Volumes One and Two (Workman Publishing); Dodosaurs - The Dinosaurs That Didn’t Make It (Harmony Books); and Elvis the Bulldozer (Random House). Because he believes a good idea can have more than one life, Rick recently did Return of the Nose Masks (Workman).

Rick adapted and illustrated two Rabbit Ears Videos for children; Paul Bunyan, narrated by Jonathan Winters, and Rip Van Winkle, narrated by Angelica Huston. Simon and Schuster has published book versions.

Rick and his friend Maira Kalman created the most talked about New Yorker cover of recent years, “New Yorkistan.” It appeared on December 10, 2001. Later that week the New York Times wrote: “when their cover came out, a dark cloud seemed to lift.” Rick and Maira continue to work together on other projects and hope to lift many dark clouds.

Rick's next book, DRUNK STONED BRILLIANT DEAD: The Writers and Artists Who Made the National Lampoon So Insanely Great, will be published by Harry N. Abrams in 2010.

 

 

In 1931, my father, Hy Meyerowitz, got a job impersonating Charlie Chaplin during the New York premier of City Lights. This is the photo. In 2005 Maira Kalman made this painting of that photo.

 

 

Rick's devoted fans have been asking what his future plans are. They also wonder why he continues to write in the third person. Some things can't be explained, but here's Rick's illustrated vision of his future.

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OGDEN NASH’S APOLOGY

“I can’t seem to escape the sins of my smart-aleck youth,” he said in 1964, seven years before his death. “Here are my amends.”

“I wrote those lines, ‘The Bronx? No thonx!’
I shudder to confess them.
Now I’m an older, wiser man. I cry,
‘The Bronx, God bless them!’”