Bernard D’ Andrea was born in a supportive family that allowed him to go pursuit art, he studied under Will Burtin in Pratt Institute and later on became an illustrator for mainly women’s magazine.
Like many other artists during WWII, D’ Andrea spent four years as an artist for the U.S Army and he met Art Cooper, Charles Cooper brother, who ran the Charles E. Cooper studio in New York City. This studio was known to work with many popular magazines that full with talented illustrators such as Coby Whitmore, Joe DeMers, Jow Bowler, and Lorraine Fox, D’ Andrea’s wife whom he married in 1951. When D’Andrea came to the studio, it was at its peak which helped him launched a successful career as an illustrator. He worked with The Saturday Evening Post for 15 years and Good Housekeeping for over 40 years. His works also appeared in Boy’s Life, Redbook, Cosmopolitan, Woman’s Home Companion, McCall’s and Seventeen.
After years of working as a commercial illustrator, D’ Andrea decided to broaden his artistic horizon and pursuing painting. After receiving training from Reuben Tam, a prominent landscape abstract expressionist who taught at the Brooklyn Museum Art School, D’ Andrea altered his views about illustrative concepts and reach out for a new direction. In 1983, D’Andrea first exhibit in Hilton Head Island was a huge success which leaded to he exhibited in the Hammer Galleries in New York City and was offered a major landscape show at the Hunter Museum of Contemporary Art in Chattanooga, Tennessee. His extensively exhibited work was also becoming part of numerous collections.
Bernard D’Andrea’s work has been produced for national and international recipients. In 2015, he was inducted into the Society of Illustrators’ Hall of Fame.His work is in the collections of the Brooklyn Museum, Hunter Museum, the U.S. Coast Guard Naval Museum in Washington, D.C., and the Telfair Museum of Arts & Sciences in Savannah, Georgia. His work has been shown in Allan Stone Galleries and Hammer Galleries of New York City, among many others.
I can’t find Bernard D’ Andrea later on paintings but I really like his commercial illustration. Figures in his painting are not just the idealize version but they look quite natural like real people. I love his colour palette and his brush stroke in every piece. Like in the piece shopping, his colour choice isn’t common during that time and the way he adds texture on everyone face except for the girl in the front is really interesting. ”Murder on the street ” painting is packed with people and I love how busy looking it is, he paid attention to every detail in the piece, even the old lady earing.