Background
Barry Moser was born on October 15, 1940, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, United States. He is the son of Arthur Boyd Moser, a professional gambler and Wilhemina Elizabeth Moser(Haggard), a homemaker.
171 Baylor School Rd, Chattanooga, TN 37405, United States
From 1951 to 1957 Barry Moser attended Baylor School.
Auburn, AL 36849, United States
Barry Moser graduated from Auburn University.
615 McCallie Ave, Chattanooga, TN 37403, United States
In 1962 Moser received a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
577 Western Ave, Westfield, MA 01086, United States
Moser holds a Doctor of Fine Arts from Westfield State College.
50 Sunset Ln, Paxton, MA 01612, United States
Moser holds a Doctor of Humanity from Anna Maria College.
Barry Moser at home in North Hatfield.
Barry Moser at home in North Hatfield.
Barry Moser at home in North Hatfield.
Barry Moser
Amherst, MA 01003, United States
Barry Moser graduated from the University of Massachusetts.
Barry Moser was born on October 15, 1940, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, United States. He is the son of Arthur Boyd Moser, a professional gambler and Wilhemina Elizabeth Moser(Haggard), a homemaker.
Moser was no fan of school, and as an adult he would learn that he had dyslexia, a condition in which the brain mixes up letters and numbers, thus affecting the ability to read. Turning to drawing rather than reading, he drew cowboys and Indians, ships, Mounties, animals, and airplanes, and also drew and traced photographs and characters from comic books and magazines. He also drew at school, preferring pictures to school work, and quickly earned a reputation as a class artist.
Moser was eventually sent to Baylor Military Academy (nowadays Baylor School), on the banks of the Tennessee River, where he spent six years. Still unenthusiastic about reading, he gravitated to biology, a class in which his drawings skills could be utilized. When not in the classroom, Moser played football and was captain of the junior varsity team; he also wrestled and was a shot-putter.
After graduating from Baylor in 1957, Moser planned to skip college and go to California where he hoped to become an animator for Walt Disney or Warner Brothers. His parents did not share his enthusiasm for a career as a cartoon animator, however, and ultimately Moser enrolled at Auburn University as a student of industrial design. He spent two years at Auburn, taking courses in drawing, perspective, and design. He also learned how to use a printing press.
In 1960, Moser transferred to the University of Chattanooga, where he studied painting under George Cross until a woodcut illustration by artist Leonard Baskin inspired him to turn to engraving. He also attempted two minors, one in biology and the other in preministerial studies. However, his difficulty with the required Latin and Greek, which he took simultaneously, convinced him to switch to a major that had no language requirement: art education. He began graduate work at the University of Massachusetts but left after a year.
Moser also holds a Doctor of Fine Arts from Westfield State College and Doctor of Humanity from Anna Maria College. In 1960 he received preacher’s license in the Holtston Conference of the Methodist Church.
Despite his dyslexia and his struggles with ancient languages, Moser became interested in words and letters. In 1962, he began teaching at the McCallie School in Chattanooga, in order to earn money for his family. He taught art, mechanical drawing, and typing, and coached weightlifting and eighth-grade football. In 1967, disenchanted with what he perceived as its narrow-mindedness, Moser left the South.
The Mosers settled in Easthampton, Massachusetts, where Barry became art instructor at the Williston Academy (now Williston-Northampton School). A meeting with Baskin, who also lived in western Massachusetts, introduced Moser to the process of publishing handmade books when he toured Baskin's small publisher, Gehenna Press. When the Academy bought printing and printmaking equipment for his department, Moser taught himself and his students how to set type, run a printing press, and make etchings and wood engravings.
In 1968 Moser co-founded Pennyroyal Press, a publishing company that specializes in producing finely designed and limited edition books; Moser founded the firm with Harold McGrath, a master printer, and Jeff Dwyer. In 1969 the University of Massachusetts Press gave Moser an assignment to illustrate an adult title, Ely: Too Black, Too White. The next year, he designed, illustrated, and printed his first book, a new edition of James Abbott McNeil Whistler's essay The Red Rag, under the Castalia Press imprint. Although Moser's first books were created for fun, when the Arion Press of San Francisco invited him to illustrate Herman Melville's novel Moby-Dick; or, The Whale in 1978, it was an offer that Moser has called "the real beginning of my present life in books."
When the University of California Press began reprinting Pennyroyal Press editions of classic works, Moser's accompanying art attained wide critical acclaim. In his rustic woodcut art for Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There Moser views the topsy-turvy world directly through the eyes of Alice, a dark-haired girl modeled on Moser's own daughter. Done in a tactile, somewhat rough style, Moser's woodcut illustrations portray Wonderland as a bizarre and even sinister place, and depict Alice's world through her own eyes.
As a small boy, Moser had enjoyed Walt Disney's animated film Song of the South. The film was based on the books of Joel Chandler Harris, a white Southerner who wrote his tales and poems under the guise of African-American slave Uncle Remus. The books and movie feature Brer Rabbit, an irrepressible trickster who always outsmarts those who seek to capture him, such as rascally Brer Fox and Brer Bear. In 1985 he was invited to illustrate an adaptation titled Jump! The Adventures of Brer Rabbit, re-told by Van Dyke Parks and Malcolm Jones, Jr. After the success of Jump!, he illustrated two additional volumes of tales featuring Brer Rabbit: Jump Again! More Adventures of Brer Rabbit and Jump on Over! The Adventures of Brer Rabbit and His Family.
Moser is author and illustrator of three other retellings set in the American South: Polly Vaughn, a refashioning of an old English ballad; Tucker Pfeffercorn: An Old Story Retold, which re-figures well-known fairy tale of Rumplestiltskin; and Good and Perfect Gifts: An Illustrated Retelling of O. Henry's "The Gift of the Magi."
Moser's illustrated retelling of The Three Little Pigs is based on the classic folktale but includes a new dimension as well. The story is set in the present day, and finds the hungry wolf efficiently disposing of the first two plump pigs before meeting his match when he tries to make a meal of the third. The wolf invites the third little pig on three outings but gets outsmarted each time; finally, he ends up as the main course of the victorious pig's dinner. Moser's humorous, detailed watercolor illustrations amplify the events of the text while providing examples of the artist's sly wit, such as the third pig using "Wolfe Pruf" cement on the bricks of his house and wearing slippers made of the wolf's fur after his nemesis gets his comeuppance.
With Fly! A Brief History of Flight Moser made his first foray into nonfiction. In this work, which is directed at young adults, the author outlines sixteen pivotal moments in the history of aviation, from the invention of the hot-air balloon to the launching of the space shuttle. The first half of the book follows a picture book format with brief text and expansive watercolor illustrations, while the second half includes expanded notes and a timeline recording concurrent historical and cultural events.
Working as an editor, Moser compiled and illustrated Great Ghost Stories, a collection of thirteen tales directed to young people. Here he includes classic horror stories by authors such as H.P. Lovecraft, Bram Stoker, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, as well as some eerie modern tales by writers such as Madeleine L'Engle, James Haskins, and Joyce Carol Oates. Each story in Great Ghost Stories is accompanied by a spooky color illustration. He pairs his unique art with short tales in several other collections geared for older, teen readers in Scary Stories and Cowboy Stories. Featuring twenty tales set in the American West, Cowboy Stories was a fun work for Moser as it tapped into childhood memories.
Throughout his career, Moser has contributed detailed watercolor illustrations as well as textured engraved images to a variety of books by other writers, from humorous, lighthearted picture-book texts to prominent works of literature, some of which feature religious themes. His best-known work in this vein, the Pennyroyal Caxton Bible, was published in 1999 and contains over two hundred engravings along with the King James Version of both the Old and New Testaments. Considered a publishing event, the Pennyroyal Caxton Bible is the only Bible issued in the twentieth century that was illustrated by a single artist. Moser spent four years working on the project, designing the volume and creating wood engravings—both decorations and full-page illustrations—for every book of both Testaments. Characteristic of Moser's approach, his work for the Bible reflects a nontraditional interpretation. For example, he depicts many of the personages of the Bible, including Jesus, as looking as if they came from the Middle East rather than from Europe, and his pictures allude to contemporary history such as the suffering of the Jews during the Holocaust. Moser's Bible was first published in a limited edition by Pennyroyal Press; fifty copies of a deluxe edition were priced at fifty thousand dollars, while the 400 copies of the standard edition sold for ten thousand dollars each. The book was also issued in a trade edition by Viking Studio and has since been published in the New Revised Standard Version.
In addition to his work as an author, illustrator, and fine artist, Moser has also served on the faculty at the Rhode Island School of Design and at Smith College; he also has held positions as a visiting scholar and been a visiting artist at several schools.
(Master Richard's Bestiary of Love and Response was illust...)
1986(Jump! The Adventures of Brer Rabbit was illustrated by Ba...)
1986(The Holy Bible was designed and illustrated by Barry Moser.)
1999(Good and Perfect Gifts was illustrated by Barry Moser.)
1997(Prayers from the Ark was illustrated by Barry Moser.)
1992(The Mushroom Man was illustrated by Barry Moser.)
1993(The King was illustrated by Barry Moser.)
1990A strong advocate for quality children's literature, he believes that children's books should hold to high artistic standards.
Quotations:
"I want to bring to trade publishing the sensibilities of the private press world, those rarefied typographic and design sensibilities. I want that to be my legacy. I’ve done that to a point with my trade books. But I plan to go back to my first love—fine books, handmade books. People in the trade world don’t know my work in the fine press world, but that’s where I belong. That’s where I cut my teeth."
"My only goal is to learn what I want to do. I don’t know my craft as well as I should, and that’s want I want to do—that’s my goal. I know it would be nice to say that I hope to do the ‘perfect’ book. I’ll never do it—it can’t be done! So I just want to do better than I did the last time. Better than I already am."
Barry Moser is a member of the National Academy of Design and American Printing History Association.
Barry Moser married Kay Richmond, an artist, in 1962. The couple divorced in 1978. Their marriage produced three children - Cara, Ramona and Madeline.