“I’m always trying to use amateur’s magic to restart what I liked about the 1960s,” Gary Panter has said about his mission as an artist. “My role, at this point, is to be a remnant of the analog [age].”

A renowned cartoonist, illustrator, painter, designer and former BFA Cartooning (now BFA Comics) faculty member, Panter has always viewed himself as a kind of archivist and conduit of the creative spirit that has become synonymous with that much-mythologized decade of the 1960s. And he channeled those free-spirited and free-wheeling concepts into his vibrant “Art Is!” SVA “subway series” poster in the spring of 2020.

However, the timing of its release during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic meant that fewer people were able to experience Panter’s poster in person. To ensure its proper recognition, SVA is re-releasing a refurbished version of the poster, which will be prominently displayed in New York’s MTA subway system this summer.

“I’ve always been a fan of Panter’s work, so I was disappointed in 2020 when his poster was released in the subway just as everyone went into lockdown,” Brian E. Smith, a BFA Design faculty member and design director at the Visual Arts Press, the College’s in-house design studio, explained. “I’m really happy it gets another shot in 2024. Panter’s artwork radiates the feeling of summer. The vibrant colors perfectly capture the essence of the season, and unlike in 2020, this time, everyone is back together in real life enjoying the sunshine.”

While Panter is no longer SVA faculty and no longer lives in New York, it is our bustling metropolis and the diverse group of people within it that inspired his original poster, featuring a unique mix of rough, lo-fi aesthetics and science fiction concepts.

“I started dreaming about this futuristic Lower East Side and a futuristic Williamsburg; I was looking to amass a vocabulary of people,” he explained at the time. “I wanted it to be positive, kind of candy-like, and have an odd color range. Everything doesn’t match up perfectly, but I’m not after that. I want something warm and human.”

Panter’s work has appeared in such publications as The New Yorker, Rolling Stone, Time, The New York Times and Esquire, and he received three Emmy awards for his production design on the 1980s TV series Pee Wee’s Playhouse.

“Making art of any sort helps us remember who we were, so that’s what I’m always trying to do,” Panter summarized. Check the original 2020 video with Panter discussing his “Art Is!” poster below.

The former SVA faculty member’s 2020 Subway SVA poster wasn’t well-seen during the COVID age, so it’s getting another shot this summer.