Welcome to Silverfish Press: home to the history and culture of big-game fishing. While books on offshore angling are plentiful enough these days, most are of two sadly similar types: the "how-to" variety and the "went there, caught that" travelogue. Regrettably, the rich and fascinating history of this unique sport has been all but ignored. But not here. Silverfish Press is delighted to feature angler/author Mike Rivkin's groundbreaking books on the origins of the sport. Its founding, hot spots, pioneers, and early contests make for absolutely spellbinding yarns, and Rivkin does it all with his award-winning panache. Order from us and we'll even get the author to personally inscribe your books.
On the artistic side, we are delighted to reintroduce Stanley Meltzoff (1917-2006) to the world angling community. Meltzoff was the very first artist to paint big-game fish in their natural realm, and he remains the undisputed master of the genre. In his day, Stanley's incredibly diverse work could be found in publications around the globe: from Field & Stream to National Geographic, Fortune to Sports Illustrated, Gray's Sporting Journal to Life. His 65 covers for Scientific American set a record that remains unchallenged to this day, and he was widely recognized in later life as one America's finest 20th century artists. Silverfish Press is honored to offer a wide variety of original art, books, giclees, and lithographs by this incredible talent. Take a look! You won't be disappointed.
STANLEY MELTZOFF
- Born March 27, 1917 in New York. Received a classical education in the arts at CCNY and NYU. Later taught at the Pratt Institute of New York and lectured at Harvard University.
- During WWII, served for five years as an illustrator for The Stars and Stripes army newspaper (Italy edition). Officed next to the famous cartoonist Bill Mauldin ("Willie and Joe") and was widely published throughout the war.
- Met with early postwar success as a commercial artist for premium Madison Avenue advertising agencies. Also worked as illustrator and cover artist of fantasy, genre, historical, landscape, science and science fiction subjects for Colliers, Cosmopolitan, Field & Stream, Life, National Geographic, Redbook, Saturday Evening Post, Scientific American, The Atlantic, and assorted paperback publishers. His famous imagery of iconic Americans conversing by phone served as universal cover art for AT&T's bicentennial telephone book in 1976, of which more than 176 million were printed.
- Avid skin and scuba diver throughout his life. Dove all the seven seas to observe the world's great game fish. Beginning in 1960 with a commission from Sports Illustrated, his career took a turn to seaward and he never looked back. Career image library of saltwater game fish includes more than 350 paintings of bonefish, bluefish, marlin, permit, rays and sharks, sailfish, snook, striped bass, swordfish, and tuna. Painted celebrated game fish covers and/or series for all the major sporting press. Widely regarded today as the first and still preeminent fish painter of all time.
- Awards include more than 25 recognitions from the Society of Illustrators and Society of Animal Artists, election in 1999 to Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame, selected to ornament conservation prints and stamps for Chesapeake Bay conservation, Izaak Walton League and Gulf Coast Conservation Association, among others.
- Collections of which Meltzoff art is a part include the National Portrait Gallery (Washington D.C.), Lee Yawkey Woodson Museum, Genesse Museum, Getty Museum of Art, National Geographic Society headquarters building, New Britain Museum of American Art, Princeton University, and numerous private collections.
- Survey articles/work illustrated in The Art of National Geographic (Jay and Carter), The Best of Sports Illustrated (1971), Art in Science portfolios I and II, various annual publications by the Society of Animal Artists and Society of Illustrators, The Illustrator in American (Reed and Reed), countless others. Life and work recently featured in Stanley Meltzoff - Picture Maker (Meltzoff and Rivkin, 2010, Silverfish Press).