[This post originally appeared in June of 2017. it’s now updated with a separate image of Arthur J. Krusz’s cover art.]
When I originally created this post, I noted that the surname of the cover artist was “Krusz”, but I was unable to find additional information about him.
Identity now established: He was Arthur J. Krusz.
Born in Missouri in 1926, Krusz obtained a degree in art from the University of Saint Louis after the Second World War, and in 1951 moved to New York with his wife Dorie. In 1962, the couple moved to Grosse Point Woods, Michigan, where he pursued a successful career as an artist, illustrator, cartoonist, and painter. Mr. Krusz died in 2014.
A review of the Internet Speculative Fiction Database shows only two entries for illustrations created by Krusz, both for Beyond Fantasy Fiction in 1954: “This” September cover, and the cover of the magazine’s May issue. Unsurprisingly, his name doesn’t appear in Wikipedia’s List of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists.
As for the actual image? The subject is direct, straightforward, and immediately recognizable: Pandora has just opened the proverbial “box”: of trouble … pain … grief … misfortune … sadness … misery … illness …war … death … and more (yikes, there’s more?!), the key to said box o’trouble lying on the ground before her. (Albeit the box’s “key” is not necessarily a specific part of the legend.)
Notice that the “box” itself is only noticeable by its golden edges, while the calamities that have escaped to befall mankind appear as intertwined anthropomorphic clouds of deep green and violet: Rather ugly clouds, at that. The landscape is consistent with the scene: it’s a desert wasteland, the only other “inhabitants” being two trees.
Not a pleasant place to be!
References
Arthur J. Krusz – Obituary
Arthur J. Krusz, at Internet Speculative Fiction Database
2017 06 29
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