Barbara Nessim (born 1939) is an American artist, illustrator, and educator.
Early life
Nessim was born in New York City in 1939. Motivated by art from a young age, she studied at the Pratt Institute in New York from 1956 to 1960. After graduating from Pratt she briefly worked in textile design while building her career as a freelance illustrator. Nessim received encouragement from her former teacher, Robert Weaver, to enter the New York Society of Illustrators 2nd annual competition in 1960 where she was awarded a "Special Mention" for a series of seven innovative monotype etchings titled, "Man and Machine . One of these works was also the cover of Communication Arts Magazine's 2nd issue. These works commented upon man's increasing dependency on the machine.
Nessim was immediately noticed by leading Art Directors of the day, notably Henry Wolf and Robert Benton from Esquire Magazine. Her illustration work continued to appear in magazines of the time, namely, Harpers Bazaar, Redbook, and the Ladies Home Journal, as well as "low brow" magazine titles such as, Escapade and Swank. Nessim's illustration work was always informed by the fine art that she continued to create for herself in her studio.
in the 1960's Nessim also designed her own line of clothing and engineered prints for Lady Van Husen which she named "Lady Vantastic" all while continuing to create her fine art work along with illustrations for magazines.
By the 1970's she was designing and illustrating posters for many clients, including Lincoln Center. She also embarked on designing a line of shoes in 1973 for Carber in Italy.
Career
Nessim was one of very few full-time professional women illustrators working in the United States during the 1960s; she was able to carve a niche for her work in the competitive graphic design field, illustrating record album covers, calendars, and magazine covers for major publications such as Rolling Stone, Time, Ms, New York Magazine, The Boston Globe, Show and Audience. She established her own graphic design firm in 1980, Nessim and Associates, with a group of fellow illustrators to work on corporate projects.
Nessim produced many works in ink and watercolor, and later incorporating computer graphics into her arsenal of mediums she mastered. She has been teaching computer art since 1980. Nessim has taught at the School of Visual Arts, Fashion Institute of Technology, and Pratt Institute, all in New York.
Her works have been exhibited worldwide, including at the Kunst Museum and The Louvre. The Museum of Modern Art in Sweden, Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Hungarian National Gallery in Budapest all hold work of hers in their permanent collections.