Robert Weaver
American, 1924-1994
Robert Weaver was an American illustrator who was considered the pioneer of a contemporary approach to the field that began in the 1950s. Beginning in 1952, he embarked on a mission to combine the visual ideas found in fine art with the responsibility of journalist. At the time, most practitioners of illustration were expected to paint and draw for advertising and magazine assignments with artwork that was conservative, idealized and saccharine. Rarely was the artist called upon to inject their own opinion into the matter. Weaver changed all of that with by moving the role of the illustrator from page decorator to a journalist who ventured out into the world and used a pencil to observe the world, record the facts, draw from life, and create visual essays. This approach would later be termed "visual journalism" and in 1983 would form the basis of a special masters degree, Illustration as Visual Essay, from the School of Visual Arts in New York.