david levine 1926 2009

portrait of david levine in his brooklyn heights studio image by gasper tringale

illustrator and artist, david levine, passed away on december 29th, 2009 at the age of 83, after suffering from prostate cancer and other illnesses. he was known for creating literary caricatures for the pages of the new york review of books(NYRB) for more than 50 years, defining the look of the magazine with memorable comic illustrations of such figures as william shakespeare and john updike – one of the artist’s most frequent subjects.

born in brooklyn, david levine studied at the brooklyn museum of art, pratt institute, the tyler school of art at temple university in philadelphia and the eighth street school of new york with hans hoffman.

besides his work for the NYBR, levine’s work has also appeared in such publications as esquire, the new york times, the new yorker, rolling stone, sports illustrated, the washington post and more.

a gallery of levine’s works for the NYRB, dating back to 1963, can be seen in an online archive here.

l: george w. bush, originally appeared with the the new york review of books’ ‘mirage of the empire’ january 12th, 2006, volume 53, no. 1 r: george w. bush, originally appeared with the the new york review of books’ ‘are we safer?’ march 9th, 2006, volume 53, no. 4

l: john updike, originally appeared with the new york review of books’ ‘easy come, easy go’ november 19th, 1981, volume 28, no. 18 r: john updike, originally appeared with the new york review of books’ ‘cock-a-doodle-doo’ april 11th, 1968, volume 10, no. 7

l: che guevara, originally appeared with the new york review of books’ ‘goodbye to all that’ july 17th, 1997, volume 44, no. 12 r: margaret atwood, originally appeared with the new york review of books’ ‘mystery women’ april 27th, 1989, volume 36, no. 7

david levine, self-portrait, 1968