Dick Francis is an artist best known for his Galaxy Science Fiction

Galaxy Science Fiction

Galaxy Science Fiction was an American digest-size science fiction magazine, published from 1950 to 1980. It was founded by an Italian company, World Editions, which was looking to break in to the American market. World Editions hired as editor H. L...

illustrations during the 1950s and 1960s.

In 1951-53, Francis was illustrating for Amazing Stories

Amazing Stories

Amazing Stories was an American science fiction magazine launched in April 1926 by Hugo Gernsback's Experimenter Publishing. It was the first magazine devoted solely to science fiction...

, Fantastic Adventures

Fantastic Adventures

Fantastic Adventures was an American pulp science fiction magazine, published from 1939 to 1953 by Ziff-Davis. It was initially edited by Ray Palmer, who was also the editor of Amazing Stories, Ziff-Davis's other science fiction title. The first nine issues were in bedsheet format, but in June 1940...

and Galaxy. In the January 1957 issue of Galaxy, Francis illustrated the lead story by Kris Neville, prompting Gabriel Mckee's comment:

It's for Kris Neville's "Moral Equivalent," the lead story in the same issue of Galaxy. The Bible doesn't figure nearly as much in that story as the illustration suggests.

Francis employed a loose, sketchy style that sometimes resembled the illustrational approach of Ed Emshwiller

Ed Emshwiller

Ed Emshwiller was a visual artist notable for illustrations of many science fiction magazine covers and for his pioneering experimental films...

. Unlike Emshwiller, he did not do covers for Galaxy, only interior illustrations. In the January 1954 issue of Galaxy, the interiors were by Francis, Emshwiller, Don Sibley and Sandy Kossin, and editor H. L. Gold

H. L. Gold

Horace Leonard Gold was a science fiction writer and editor. Born in Canada, Gold moved to the United States at the age of two...

 employed this core group to illustrate for Galaxy on a regular basis during the 1950s.

Francis also contributed to Gold's Beyond Fantasy Fiction

Beyond Fantasy Fiction

Beyond Fantasy Fiction was a US fantasy fiction magazine edited by H. L. Gold, with only ten issues published from 1953 to 1955. The last two issues carried the cover title of Beyond Fiction, but the publication's name for copyright purposes remained as before.Although not a commercial success, it...

. the fantasy companion magazine to Galaxy, beginning with his illustration for Frederik Pohl

Frederik Pohl

Frederik George Pohl, Jr. is an American science fiction writer, editor and fan, with a career spanning over seventy years — from his first published work, "Elegy to a Dead Planet: Luna" , to his most recent novel, All the Lives He Led .He won the National Book Award in 1980 for his novel Jem...

's "The Ghost Maker" in the January 1954 issue. For Beyond he also illustrated stories by Theodore R. Cogswell and Reginald Bretnor

Reginald Bretnor

Reginald Bretnor was a science fiction author who flourished between the 1950s and 1980s. Most of his fiction was in short story form, and usually featured a whimsical story line or ironic plot twist...

.

During the late 1950s and early 1960s, Francis lived at 105 Christopher Street

Christopher Street (Manhattan)

Christopher Street is a street in the West Village neighborhood of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is the continuation of 9th St. to the west of its intersection with 6th Ave. The Stonewall Inn is located on Christopher Street, and, therefore, the street was at the center of New York's...

in Greenwich Village.

External links

• "Reason" Redux: Galouye's "All Jackson's Children"