Chris Moore (1947-2025)
Science fiction cover artist Chris Moore passed away earlier this month. Moore's covers were a major factor in shaping the sleek, airbrushed spaceships that defined the science fiction genre in the UK across the '70s, the '80s, and the '90s.
I post his artwork regularly to this art blog newsletter and I included a two-page spread about him in my art book Worlds Beyond Time. I certainly didn't know him well, but I enjoyed our email conversations while I was making the book; he was both cordial and frank.
That frankness is on display in this exchange from a 2011 interview with Lightspeed magazine:
Q: While your gallery features a variety of styles, the majority of your art seems to be science fiction. What appeals to you about this genre?
A: The answer to this question, which I feel many science fiction readers probably don’t want to hear, is that I am essentially a jobbing illustrator who handles pretty much anything that is offered to me provided that it’s interesting in some way. I get the impression that to some extent, the science fiction readership would like one to be more “purist” and “emotionally involved” with the subject. I do get emotional about my work, but not exclusively the science fiction. I get the kick from producing something that’s visually exciting, a good idea, and that’s right for the book.
I got that Lightspeed quote from this great roundup of information about Moore from downthetubes, but it's certainly no surprise, based on his polite ambivalence towards the science fiction genre in his art collection Journeyman.
Here's the Locus mag obit for him, as well as his SF Encyclopedia entry.
I'll end this post with a collection of my favorite Chris Moore artworks, but first, here's a fun anecdote about the guy that I mentioned in this newsletter back in 2021. At the time, Moore had just responded to an email from a friend of mine who asked if Moore could confirm or deny being the artist for this 1982 edition of John Brunner's Into the Slave Nebula.
Moore's response:
"This is a very interesting one for me: everything about this image suggests I did it, the style of spaceship, the surface markings even the planet with details of roads etc it’s all stuff that I did and clearly the way I make those marks is in itself quite distinctive so, I’m sure it’s my painting but and it’s a big but, I don’t remember at this ripe old age having done it."
[...] "I was churning these things out, almost a production line, at the rate of 2 a week."
How frank is that? Rest in peace to a science fiction art titan.
Next Time: Trains of the Future