Browsing Tag

1990s

Comic Reptiles: Steve White on Dinosaurs: A Celebration

Illustration Interview September 16, 2026

While it’s true that That Movie launched the dinosaur obsessions of (possibly) millions in ’93, it’s always important to remember that it rode in on the peak of a wave of Dinomania inspired by the Dinosaur Renaissance. Dinosaurs were no longer the tail-dragging, swamp-hogging, brown dullards of the mid 20th century, but were now athletic, dynamic, colourful and exciting. Popular books and documentaries (like the Walter Cronkite-starring Dinosaur!), along with the latest generation of life-sized roaring museum robots and cool…

Vintage Dinosaur Art: Lone Star Dinosaurs – Part 1

Vintage Dinosaur Art September 5, 2026

Karen Carr is one of those artists whose lack of presence on this blog seems to defy explanation; originally from Texas (but now living in New Mexico), she has a huge palaeoart back catalogue, with work featured in a wide range of institutions and publications. Go and check out her website for just a taste. She’s chiefly a natural history artist, although that’s definitely underselling the diversity of her art, which ranges from murals to sculptures to maps. Of course,…

Podcast Show Notes: Episode 51 – Parkersaurs to Ultimasaurs

Podcast Show Notes July 22, 2026

In this slightly-delayed-by-the-heatwave episode, Gemma, Marc and Natee finally get around to discussing some of the best-known and most widely reproduced and copied palaeoart of all time – Neave Parker’s monochrome saurians as published in the Natural History Museum (or rather, British Museum (Natural History))’s 1960s book entitled Dinosaurs. Then, Marc interviews American artist and author Timothy J Bradley on a career that encompasses Dinamation (see episode 49), toy design for Hasbro and literally hundreds of illustrations for the Jurassic Park Institute…

Podcast Show Notes: Episode 49 – Robots and Comics

Podcast Show Notes May 15, 2026

Episode fifty minus one is finally here, and we’re back looking at some non-traditional forms of palaeoart! Gemma, Marc and Natee discuss the beloved animatronics made by the Dinamation company in the 1980s and 1990s. Then, Natee and Gemma interview the unsung Sean Hennesy, whose dinosaur comics under the name “Speed Thief” combine art with comedy. We discuss how cartoons can inspire curiosity, and how a little bit of humour can make the knowledge go down better. Is dino animatronic…

Vintage Dinosaur Art: The Life and Death of the Dinosaurs

Vintage Dinosaur Art April 24, 2026

While John Sibbick Normanpedia knock-offs were pretty ubiquitous in the late ’80s and early ’90s, the illustrations in this book just might be unique in combining classic Sibbickisms with a more John McLoughlin-like, monochrome, stipply style. A rather obscure little volume very kindly sent over from the States by Herman Diaz, The Life and Death of the Dinosaurs was published in 1990 by the Palos Verdes Peninsula Audubon Society, written by Joseph K Slap (great name), and illustrated by Elaine…

Vintage Dinosaur Art: All About Dinosaurs – Part 2

Vintage Dinosaur Art April 9, 2026

By the popular request of a single commenter, here’s yet more All About Dinosaurs, written by Rupert Oliver, illustrated by Bernard Long, and first published in 1983 (with this edition arriving in 1990). I conveniently forgot that said commenter (Andreas Johansson) enthusiastically responded to the promise of more non-dinosaurs that I might have made, and have instead mostly scanned a number of further dinosaur illustrations by Long. Hurrah! We’ll start with this Corythosaurus, for it actually serves as the frontispiece for the…

Vintage Dinosaur Art: All About Dinosaurs

Vintage Dinosaur Art March 10, 2026

Here’s a title that might seem familiar to you – perhaps because I reviewed a completely different book of the same name back in 2014, but more likely because it’s about as generic a 1980s retro-a-thon as one can get. While the Dinosaur Renaissance was very much underway, producing some of the most memorable and iconic (sorry, but it’s true) palaeoart of all time, anyone growing up at the time was far more likely to have their image of dinosaurs…

Vintage Dinosaur Art: Dinosaur Dream

Vintage Dinosaur Art March 2, 2026

You know, I’ve only done one Vintage Dinosaur Art project in the entire year of 2025? Granted, it was the mammoth, three part project on Marie Hubrecht at the Lyceum, the results of which are used in her biography, but still. It’s time to crank it up a notch, and the best way to pick up the pace is to scale back the size of the projects. Let’s do a cute children’s book. Dennis Nolan (1945-2022) was a painter in…

Vintage Dinosaur Art: Dinosaurs (Kingfisher My First Encyclopedia) – part 2

Vintage Dinosaur Art December 9, 2025

By popular request – and by that, I mean literally a single person asked for it – here’s another little look at Dinosaurs, published in 2000 as part of Kingfisher’s My First Encyclopedia series, although all of the content dates to 1994 (and it shows). As the last post featured a lot of work by Ann Winterbotham, it’s only fair that the work of the other illustrators gets an airing this time. Don’t say I don’t spoil you, Andrew McLeod. While…

Vintage Dinosaur Art: Dinosaurs (Kingfisher My First Encyclopedia)

Vintage Dinosaur Art November 4, 2025

Right then – who remembers this one? Hopefully quite a few of you, as it was originally published in 1990 in hardback as part of the Young World series, with this paperback recycling appearing in 2000. It may well have been translated into other languages, too (Agata seems to remember a Polish edition). It’s just one of the hundreds and hundreds (probably) of kids’ books about dinosaurs churned out by well-known palaeontologist Michael Benton while on his coffee breaks in…

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