Covers sell, whether it’s books or magazines. This was just as important for pulp magazines as it was for men’s adventure magazines.
One of the best of the MAM artists is Mort Künstler (1927–2025). The folks behind Men’s Adventure Library — Bob Deis and Wyatt Doyle — have been putting out several collections on various MAM artists. They put out Mort Künstler: The Godfather of Pulp Fiction Illustrators in 2019. It’s still available in deluxe hardback and paperback.
Now they have put out the first of two volumes focused on his cover art: Mort Künstler Covered, Vol. 1. As with the previous book, this one is available in deluxe hardback and paperback. But the hardcover has 20 more pages than the paperback (140 vs. 120). It’s done in a similar style to their collection of George Gross‘s covers. A second volume is promised; I’m just not sure when. I have no idea if they will do more than that.
Full disclosure, I was sent a copy of the hardback volume.
His covers show the great variety of stories and themes in the MAMs. We get action and adventure, war, battle, crime, survival in the jungle, and more. Lots of manly men and hot women. Everything you expect from magazines aimed at men.
The book kicks off with Deis’s 2011 interview with Künstler. From this conversation, we learn of his long association with illustrating men’s adventure, as well as other work. He reveals he did a lot of artwork for Aurora Plastics for many of its model kits. And that it was due to him that James Bama would do the artwork for their monster models. I was not aware of that. I’ve heard a lot about Bama’s work for them. And we learned about him getting into historical paintings.
The bulk of the volume is the cover images. It’s organized by each magazine: Action for Men, Action Life, Adventure, Adventure Life, Battlefield, and For Men Only (the biggest section). At the start of each section, we get a brief overview of the magazine. Most of the magazines were part of Martin Goodman‘s MAMs, which Künstler mainly worked for. And For Men Only was his flagship title. I just wish they gave more space on the cover for art. I did enjoy the animal attack-themed cover of “They Wanted My Flesh” with rabid minks…
If you enjoyed this one, consider getting its sequel, as well as the earlier volume that includes his interior artwork.
Also, as noted, Künstler later got into doing paintings of historical scenes, especially the Civil War. There are actually several books collecting this artwork you can find on Amazon, including a multi-volume set just on his Civil War work.
As always, this is another winner from the Men’s Adventure Library. In addition to the artwork collections, they also have several collections of articles and fiction from the MAMs, some of which I’ve reviewed here.
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