Dold, Elliott
Entry updated 6 October 2023. Tagged: Artist, Editor.
(1889-1957) US illustrator, son of noted psychiatrist William Elliott Dold (1856-1942) and younger brother of Douglas Dold. His birth year is often given as 1892, but 1889 has been confirmed. Dold studied art at the College of William and Mary in Virginia to 1912, and with his brother joined the Serbian army in 1915. Although his 44 Art Deco drawings for Harold Hersey's Night (1923) are perhaps his finest work, Dold is now best remembered for his interior Illustrations for the early sf Pulp magazines, also in an Art Deco idiom. Using only black and white (with virtually no greys), he was a master at depicting looming, massive, superbly detailed and intricate Machines that dwarfed their human operators, whom he depicted with relative indifference. Dold contributed to Astounding Science-Fiction 1934-1938, and was one of that magazine's finest interior illustrators; his illustrations for its serialization of E E "Doc" Smith's Skylark of Valeron (August 1934-February 1935 Astounding; 1949) are considered classics. He edited (effectively as managing editor in collaboration with his blind brother Douglas Dold, the named editor), created colour covers and wrote a lead story – "The Bowl of Death" – for Hersey's short-lived 1931 magazine Miracle Science and Fantasy Stories.
His last original sf appearances were in 1941, when he contributed interior art to Stirring Science Stories (June 1941) and painted a cover for Cosmic Stories (July 1941). Several pieces are reprinted in Hier, l'an 2000: L'illustration de science fiction des années 30 (1973; trans as 2000 A.D.: Illustrations from the Golden Age of Science Fiction Pulps 1975) by Jaques Sadoul. [RB/JG/DRL]
see also: Astounding Science-Fiction.
William Elliott Dold Jr
born New York: 3 October 1889
died Charlottesville, Virginia: 1957
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