The Artists - Remembering Robert McGinnis
Last month we were saddened to learn of the passing of movie poster legend Robert E. McGinnis. In a career of nearly eighty years, he created over seventy movie posters, including some of the most iconic of the second half of the twentieth century.
Following success illustrating paperback covers (he would go on to paint over 1,500), his first movie poster was an absolute corker, 1961’s Breakfast At Tiffany’s. He said of his iconic image of little-black-dressed Audrey Hepburn “You didn’t have to do much with her. She’s so perfect.”
His first James Bond movie poster was for 1965’s Thunderball and he would follow that with incredible posters for Casino Royale (1967), You Only Live Twice (1967), On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969), Live and Let Die (1973) and The Man With The Golden Gun (1974).
007 producer Barbara Broccoli stated that McGinnis captured “..the wit, excitement and adventure of Bond in a series of brushstrokes.”
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In 2004, at the age of seventy-eight, he was called upon to produce a poster for Brad Bird’s The Incredibles. It beggars belief that it was never used. If it wasn’t for a call out from director Brad Bird, we may never have known it existed.
In the 2014 book “The Art of Robert E. McGinnis” Bob stated “Painting is addictive. There is never enough time, never enough satisfaction … Nevertheless, painting is a good friend and I’m fortunate to be blissfully under its spell.”
He continued to paint well into his advancing years, recently producing covers for the works of Neil Gaiman, but passed, at the age of 99, on the 10th March 2025.
Announcing Robert's passing, his children wrote “Remember Bob the next time Ohio State beats Michigan in football. Or when you see the Breakfast At Tiffany’s movie poster image of Audrey Hepburn with a cat perched on her shoulder. Our father created that!”
You can read a lot more about Robert McGinnis and see all of his movie posters in our earlier blog post.
