Steve Fiorilla (January 12, 1961 – July 29, 2009) was an American artist born in

Paterson, New Jersey Paterson ( ) is the largest City (New Jersey), city in and the county seat of Passaic County, New Jersey, Passaic County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey.Buffalo, New York Buffalo is a Administrative divisions of New York (state), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York and county seat of Erie County, New York, Erie County. It lies in Western New York at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of ...

. Throughout his career, Fiorilla emphasized the grotesque and surreal in illustrations, sculpture and fine art. As a sculptor, he produced a variety of bizarre, malformed creatures. His film reviews appeared under the pseudonym Jacques Corédor.

Print

Fiorilla illustrated for books and magazines ('' Heavy Metal'', '' Video Games and Computer Entertainment'', ''

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''), T-shirts, small press journals (''Eegah!'', ''Magick Theatre'', ''

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''), catalog covers ( Gregg Press), fanzines (''Horror from the Crypt of Fear'') and mini-comics (''City Scenes''). One of his 1985 sculptures was featured 12 years later on a cover for the magazine ''Bloodsongs'' (1997). He created numerous drawings and product designs for Ed "Big Daddy" Roth, including a belt buckle, T-shirts, caps, ads and catalog illustrations. Fiorilla sometimes worked in tandem with illustrator

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, such as their collaboration for Stephen J. Spignesi's ''The Complete Stephen King Encyclopedia'' (1991).

Film and television

Fiorilla's work for films included sculptural designs for Boston's Olive Jar Animation. The short film ''Things Never Seen'' (1989), with creatures designed by Fiorilla, received multiple showings on

MTV MTV (an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable television television channel, channel and the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group sub-division of the Paramount Media Networks division of Paramount Global. Launched on ...

during the 1980s and 1990s. In addition to special effects makeup for videos (Tennie Komar and the Silencers) and films ('' Winterbeast'', 1991), he designed masks for Death Studios and horror films, including ''Saturday the 14th'' (1981) and ''Till Death Do We Scare'' (1982). The MTV animated logo "Guillotine" featured a sculpted horror by Fiorilla, and he also created the customized skeleton guitar writhing in a popular 1987

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video seen on MTV.

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publisher

Bill Gaines William Maxwell "Bill" Gaines (; March 1, 1922 – June 3, 1992) was an American publisher and co-editor of EC Comics. Following a shift in EC's direction in 1950, Gaines presided over what became an artistically influential and historically i ...

owned one of Fiorilla's latex masks depicting EC's Old Witch (''

The Haunt of Fear ''The Haunt of Fear'' is an American bi-monthly horror comic anthology series that was published by EC Comics from 1950 to 1954 created by Bill Gaines and Al Feldstein. The magazine began in June 1947 as ''Fat and Slat''. It continued under this ...

''). In the second season of HBO's ''Tales from the Crypt'' anthology television series, a photo of this Old Witch mask was a prop in the June 26, 1990 "Korman's Kalamity" episode, adapted from the EC story "Kamen's Kalamity". Illustrated by Jack Kamen, the original self-satirical story is set in EC's offices where the EC editors have a meeting with Kamen about his artwork.

Miscellaneous work

''Buffalo's Low Down Dirty Low Brow Art Show'' was a 2002 group exhibition "inspired by the artwork of Steve Fiorilla", although he did not participate in the show. Fiorilla's articles and reviews were published in the online magazine, ''Flickhead''. He also did film reviews under the pseudonym Jacques Corédor (a pun on

Samuel Fuller Samuel Michael Fuller (August 12, 1912 – October 30, 1997) was an American film director, screenwriter, novelist, journalist, and actor. He was known for directing low-budget genre movies with controversial themes, often made outside t ...

's film ''Shock Corridor''). Fee Fie Foe... Fiorilla! is a blog displaying Fiorilla's characters in a surreal narrative setting. Steve Fiorilla died on July 29, 2009, in Buffalo at the age of 48."Steven C. Fiorilla, widely renowned artist of the grotesque," ''Buffalo News'', August 6, 2009.
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References

External links

Fee Fie Foe... Fiorilla!Latex Mask Central
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fiorilla, Steve 1961 births 2009 deaths 20th-century American male artists 20th-century American sculptors Alternative cartoonists American magazine illustrators American magazine cartoonists American fantasy artists American surrealist artists American horror artists American film critics American animated film directors American male sculptors American people of Italian descent Artists from Buffalo, New York Artists from Paterson, New Jersey Sculptors from New York (state)