Richard Merkin — painter, illustrator and professor emeritus at the Rhode Island School of Design — has died at the age of 70. Known as much for his insanely dapper appearance as for his art, a Merkin sighting during his long tenure here was always a cause for mention. Writer Tom Wolfe (no slouch in the style arena) described him to The New York Times as “the greatest of that breed, the Artist Dandy”. Merkin himself told the NYT in 1967, “My sartorial aspirations lie somewhere between the Duke of Windsor and the Duke of Ellington”
But despite his many artistic accomplishments, his illustrations appearing in The New Yorker and Vanity Fair, every obit will necessarily mention the fact that he is between the Vargas Girl and Fred Astaire on the cover of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
rip, merkin . . .
you were a great funny man. i remember Richard Merkin
coming into our shop What Cheer? in Wayland Square
wearing a very strange outfit and informing my wife and i that
he had found yourself 4 or five times in our inventory – on
the cover of Sgt. Pepper’s, in magazines, and i forget what
else. Providence has lost another of its great characters!