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 The Children Set Sail With Music – Willy Pogany

William Andrew was better known as Willy Pogany (born Vilmos Andreas Pogány) (August 1882 – 30 July 1955) was a prolific Hungarian illustrator of children’s books and others. His contemporaries include C. Coles Phillips, Joseph Clement Coll, Edmund Dulac, Harvey Dunn, Walter Everett, Harry Rountree, Sarah Stilwell Weber, and N.C. Wyeth. He is best known for his pen and ink drawings of myths and fables. A large portion of Pogany’s work is described as Art Nouveau. Pogany’s artistic style is heavily fairy-tale orientated and often feature motifs of mythical animals such as nymphs and pixies. He paid great attention to botanical details. He used dreamy and warm pastel scenes with watercolors, oil paintings, and especially pen and ink. Painstakingly detailed and confident, Pogany’s pen and ink pieces portray the true extent of his talent.

Pogany was born in Szeged, Austria-Hungary. He studied at Budapest Technical University and in Munich and Paris. He spent his early childhood with his brothers and sisters in a large farmhouse full of chickens, ducks, geese, dogs, pigs, and horses.

When he was six, his parents took him to Budapest where he would later be sent to school. He had early ambitions on becoming an engineer in the hopes of looking after his mother after his father died. He especially liked to row and to play soccer. In his spare time, he drew pictures and painted. He enjoyed painting and drawing so much he decided to be an artist. He attended Budapest Technical School for less than a year, during this time he took art classes for six weeks. He sold his first painting to a wealthy patron for $24. He spent his early twenties attending art school and would later travel to Munich, Paris, and London before coming to the United States in 1914.

When Willy Pogany went to Paris to study and paint, nobody paid too much attention to him or bought his pictures. He was very poor and often went hungry.

When he finally saved up some money from his work, he left Paris to go to London. Pogany spent two years in Paris and ten in London. In 1906, Rackham’s Rip Van Winkle gained massive popularity, sparking a demand for artists in London. For The Welsh Fairy Book by T. Fisher Unwin, Pogany illustrated over 100 plates, illustrations, vignettes, chapter heads and tails, and initials. Milly and Olly had 48. The Adventures of a Dodo had 70. Faust had 30 color plates. Willy Pogany is most often remembered for his most famous work The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

Besides book illustration, pictures, mural paintings, portraits, etchings, and sculptures, when he moved to America Pogany became interested in theatre and designed stage settings and costumes for different shows and the Metropolitan Opera House. Although reluctant at first, he moved to Hollywood to serve as an art director for several film studios during the 1930s and 1940s.