Erik Nitsche

Erik Nitsche (September 7, 1908 - November 14, 1998) was a Swiss-born designer who, after moving to the United States at the age of 26, had a long and successful career as a graphic designer and art director. He's most famous for the work he did for General Dynamics, the engineering company, but also created many iconic record album and book covers. I love his abstract geometric images humanized by delicate color palettes. Enjoy!

Poster for General Dynamics, Convair 880: world's fastest jetliner, 1959 via galerie123.com

Poster for General Dynamics, General Dynamics, liquid carbonic, medical gases, 1960 — Poster for General Dynamics, General Dynamics, liquid carbonic, medical gases, 1960

Poster for General Dynamics, Astrodynamics, Atoms for peace, 1955 — Poster for General Dynamics, Astrodynamics, Atoms for peace, 1955

Poster for General Dynamics (Triga around the world, General Atomic) 1960

J.S Bach, The Well-tempered clavier, Decca Records

Rachmaninoff for Decca Records via — Rachmaninoff for Decca Records via

Magazine illustration, Eyes of the fighting 9th

Read and see more here: iconofgraphics.com, Erik Nitsche Design Archive and galerie123.com

Jim Flora

James Flora, children's book author, magazine illustrator, creator of some of the most zany & memorable album art covers of all time. Remember albums?? Check out the Jim Flora website, run by his family and heirs. There you can learn & see lots more plus purchase fine art prints.

1947 Kid Ory and His Creole Jazz Band 78 album cover

Fetcher Henderson 1942, this work is being featured as set dressing on Showtime's "Masters of Sex", one of my must-watch shows.

Jim Flora Art has released a limited-edition, archival-quality fine art print of an uncirculated, untitled 1940s-era

Jim Flora | The Day the Cow Sneezed via Stickers and Stuff

+flora.com

Jim Flora | The Day the Cow Sneezed. See more here: Stickers and Stuff — Jim Flora | The Day the Cow Sneezed. See more here: Stickers and Stuff

The fabulous Alex Steinweiss

Alex Steinweiss was the man who basically invented the album cover. Before him, record sets were sold in book-like albums with brown paper interior sleeves containing multiple records, and the covers were simply plain, like the old photo albums or scrapbooks.

Steinweiss convinced his bosses at Columbia records to invest in the equipment to print on these covers. They started with generic covers that would leave a space for the album titles, and then gradually each album would have it's own conceptual design, as we know it today.

For more covers and info, visit Poul Webb's blog here.

This is an example of one of Steinweiss's early generic covers, used for symphonic works, the title would be inserted in the white box.

Wilhelm Furtwangler conducts Schumann & Haydn. mid 1950s

Paul Hindemith "Die Harmonie Der Welt" mid 1950s

I love this Boswell Sisters cover from 1942, as I love the Boswell Sisters themselves, but we'll talk about that later!

+poulwebb.blogspot.com

Otl Aicher

Aka Otto Aicher (1922 – 1991) was a German graphic designer best known for creating the stick figures that we see in use on modern international signage (think restroom man & woman symbols) for the 1972 Munich Olympics. He also created the Rotis font family. I believe these are record album covers from around 1950.