Mark Ulriksen (born 1957) is an United States Painting and magazine illustrator.
Education and early professional life
After studying at California State University, Chico and University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Ulriksen's first major position was as
art director of San Francisco Magazine (formerly San Francisco Focus magazine) from 1986 until 1993, when he began to devote all his time and attention to painting and illustrating. His art pieces have made appearances in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Paris, and Rome, and some of his pieces permanently reside at the Smithsonian Institution, the Library of Congress, and the Museum of Contemporary Art of Rome.
Relationship with The New Yorker magazine
Ulriksen's first significant illustration assignments came in 1993 from
The New Yorker, at the time under the helm of editor
Tina Brown, a relationship that has continued to this day. His contributions made history for the magazine with the first cover illustrating the content of the issue (the
White House under then-President
Bill Clinton, which was also the first issue to include, in the article, further small pictures illustrating the content of the article). Since then he has been a regular contributor to the magazine, and has been responsible for numerous cover images. In addition, he has (on multiple occasions) been paired with the noted baseball writer
Roger Angell to illustrate
The New Yorker's annual
baseball season wrap.
Other work
Ulriksen has also contributed to Rolling Stone Magazine,
VIBE, GQ Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Time Magazine, and
Newsweek, and his work features in the permanent collection of The Smithsonian, the Library of Congress and the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna (the Museum of Contemporary Art),
Rome.
[ TRAFTA- Mark Ulriksen] Ulriksen has also illustrated two children's books
The Biggest Parade (Henry Holt, 2006) and
Dog Show (Henry Holt, 2006) by author Elizabeth Winthrop. He is the artist for the
SFJAZZ Center. In 2014, he published the book " Dogs Rule Nonchalantly."
Artistic style
Ulriksen's style incorporates his loves of
and
baseball, as well as drawing on his family and friends (in a manner akin to
Norman Rockwell) to serve as
Anonymity subjects for his illustrations. It is a style that is expressionistic, quirky, angular, and painterly, with exaggerated features (usually very small hands and feet), but which captures the essence of his subjects dead-on with sweetness, light humor, and joy.
Awards won
Ulriksen's cover for the February 27, 2006 edition of
The New Yorker won the 2006 American Society of Magazine Editors award for Best News Magazine Cover. The cover, titled
Watch Your Back Mountain was prompted by the hunting incident earlier in the month when Vice President
Dick Cheney accidentally shot and injured Harry Whittington. The cover depicts Cheney and President George W. Bush dressed as cowboys, with Cheney holding a smoking
shotgun and Bush lurking behind him, in homage to the 2005 film Brokeback Mountain. The ASME, in announcing the award, said that the image "
evokes both the smugness of a vice president implicated in catastrophe and the cluelessness of a president incapable of stopping him".
[ 2006 Best News Cover Winner and Finalists ]
Ulriksen is the recipient of Gold and Silver medals from the Society of Illustrators.
Personal life
A lifelong fan of
baseball (in particular The Giants and The Boston Red Sox), Ulriksen is married to the
photographer Leslie Flores. They live in
Cole Valley,
San Francisco with their two daughters and their chocolate Labrador, Ivy.
Bibliography
External links
