In the paintings of JOHN PHILIP FALTER (1910-1982), the central element is always perspective. Not necessarily geometric perspective, either; it is the perspective given by distance or association, by the way we see individuals in contrast to their homes or their places of work and leisure. Falter favored a bird's-eye view for many of his subjects, affording us a careful, objective look at an animated landscape which he interpreted with large blocks of color highlighted by crisp human details. His best works are not about people but about their place in the "big picture". It is no surprise that at mid-career, he became one of the small stable of post-War Saturday Evening Post cover artists when, under editor Ben Hibbs, the cover focus of that magazine shifted from storytelling to the portrayal of the American scene, a shift for which Falter was inadvertently responsible.

When, on a chance visit to Falter's studio in 1944, Post art editor Ken Stuart saw a painting of a quiet morning off New York's Gramercy Park, Stuart immediately offered to purchase it as a cover piece, although the artist had not intended it as such. Here was a deceptively simple picture which nevertheless rendered a variegated urban scene with great visual harmony and managed to include nineteen characters! Stuart recognized the guaranteed appeal of the approach and soon the Post's best illustrators were assigned to depict the country region by region. Falter eventually produced over 200 covers for the Post alone. His prolific output also included forty books for Reader's Digest and an outstanding series of Bicentennial oil paintings executed for the 3M Company in 1976, the year he was elected to the Society of Illustrators' Hall of Fame.           -J. P.

[Saturday Evening Post cover, Gramercy Park, March 25, 1944, oil on board 24 x 20"]