Painted covers

[evanhickscartoonist]

Are painted covers having a moment right now? What comes to mind for me is recent work from Nate Garcia, Alex Graham and Simon Hanselman. I suppose there are a lot of books from the past that also have painted covers, but it feels like like these three are driving the trend of covers that look both cartoony and intentionally painterly at the same time. Is there anywhere else this trend could be coming from? Accessibility of large flatbed scanners perhaps...

Is it my imagination that this style is more represented in covers than in interior pages? I know the cartoonists I mentioned incorporate painting in many aspects of their work.

I think having a painted cover can be misleading about the contents of the book, but for the part of the audience that's "in on it", it's a nice way to pay special dedication to the cover. It is definitely eye-catching! Wondering what others think, I selfishly want to hear because I'm thinking about trying a painted cover for my next book.

[mikesheawright]

i was just thinking about this recently too actually, it does seem to be in vogue right now. i think covers are tough for a lot of artists because they put a lot of pressure on the cover selling the book. making a painted cover gives the impression that the artist spent a lot of time on it and maybe that makes it more "important" than a cover next to it. like you can inject gravitas into any image by making it more impressive on a technical level? it also stands out in a sea of garbage Procreate covers while still being colorful. there are a lot of awesome painted covers out there but there are some really boring ones too where i'm like why the hell did you paint that.

i just got Swag 6 in the mail and that cover is so badass. it looks like he knocked it out in ten minutes, it's so bold and audacious i love it. proves that you don't have to spend 100 hours painting a cover for it to be attention-grabbing.

[addley]

I like just doing it on the covers, one can really put your all in it. And then I can display it in my room! My favorite recent example of that is Nate Garcia's Plum Pocket. I love that cover..

This is also great about albums, a really good cover can color the experience in an essential way.

[argethebarge]

i love a painted cover. there are some great painted covers for manga, slam dunk comes to mind and there are definitely others. i def don’t feel like it misrepresents a book but i also wouldn’t expect a book to be fully painted 99% of the time