Back in the late 1970's, the National Football League employed the services of many established young, up and coming artists to produce artwork for publications, posters and promotions. Many of these artists had long and fruitful careers with the NFL and produced some of the most memorable sporting art ever seen. Artists such as Chuck Ren, Jim Lamb, Paul Kratter and Keith Batcheller particularly gave us some memorable images, including program covers, prints and the now highly desirable Damac range of team and city themed posters.
This site is a tribute to those artists and their wonderful work, and in particular the late Charles Ren, whose work continues to be inspirational and influential to aspiring artists like myself. We hope this site not only highlights some of these fantastic works, but also serves as a fitting tribute to Chuck Ren.

Throughout the site, we'll have features and interviews with artists like Paul Kratter, Keith Batcheller and Chuck's son Jon, who learned from his father and is a talented and successful artist in his own right. There's a special section on the famous Damac range of posters, and some analysis, as well as, stories behind their creation. We've also got our own Damac tribute section, where we have created our own team themed style posters.
The 'Pro!' section of the site concentrates on the excellent cover work that graced the NFL's own Gameday magazine, with work by many different artists including those featured here.

This site will be an ongoing project, as we uncover more examples of the artists' works and the stories behind them, and we hope this becomes a useful resource and interesting archive of their work.

Enjoy the site!

Dan Tearle and Michael Princip

 

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT!

Chuck Ren's son, Jon, is offering five of Chuck's paintings for sale, and has asked IllustratedNFL to advertise them on the site. Please click here to view the paintings, pricing and contact information.