Pregame Football Players Lined Up Abstraction of Blue Jersey and Orange Numbers

It's 1964, and the brilliantly inventive artist/illustrator Bob Peak is turning the world of commercial art upside down. In "Pregame Football Players" for Sports Illustrated, Peak puts the viewer on the field behind the knees of the football players. He depicts them in a pregame pep talk as more of an abstraction than a representation. Notice the Army marching colors seen through the legs of the center player. Peak ties an extremely wide-angle close-up with figurative elements in the distance. His radical cropping with broad areas of bold blue accented by strokes of calligraphic orange makes this work more of the domain of abstract painting than an expected magazine illustration. Congratulations to the Art Director and Editors at Time/Life for being brave enough to run such a stylized look for their football story. Bob Peak in my opinion, was the Norman Rockwell of post-war American Illustration, with this work being one of his seminal works that paved the way for a new way of seeing. It's more fine art than commercial art. Signed lower right. Unframed -Condition: Some creases, mostly visible with raking light. Tape remnants on the perimeter look very artsy and add to the overall quick and bold look of the work. Colors are bold, saturated and punchy.