The artist and cartoonist Donald Reilly, a longtime veteran of The New Yorkerpassed away on Sunday in Connecticut from complications relating to cancer. He was 72.
Reilly was born in 1933 in Scranton, Pennsylvania. After receiving an undergraduate degree from Muhlenberg College, he entered the Navy. After leaving the service, he attended art class at Cooper Union. He graduated in 1963, and began his association with The New Yorker in 1964. According to the New York Times obituary, Reilly worked for many of the top cartoon and illustration clients of the period, including Playboy, The Saturday Evening Post, Mad and Colliers. He would go on to do over 1100 cartoons and 16 covers for his most representative client; his cartoons were distinguished by use of wash and a certain bluntness to the jokes -- like the most emblematic cartoons in The New Yorker during the William Shawn era there was very little wasted time in a Reilly cartoon.
Reilly is survived by a wife, a sister, three children, three stepchildren and eight grandchildren.
Reilly was born in 1933 in Scranton, Pennsylvania. After receiving an undergraduate degree from Muhlenberg College, he entered the Navy. After leaving the service, he attended art class at Cooper Union. He graduated in 1963, and began his association with The New Yorker in 1964. According to the New York Times obituary, Reilly worked for many of the top cartoon and illustration clients of the period, including Playboy, The Saturday Evening Post, Mad and Colliers. He would go on to do over 1100 cartoons and 16 covers for his most representative client; his cartoons were distinguished by use of wash and a certain bluntness to the jokes -- like the most emblematic cartoons in The New Yorker during the William Shawn era there was very little wasted time in a Reilly cartoon.
