William Bryant just moved to Portland via Austin and just killed the New York Times Magazine front cover with the illustrated question of the year “What if the Secret to Success is Failure?”

This man can draw, and he draws everyday. Plus he’s humble and nice and hard working.
So that’s amazing.

Mr. Bryant has been generous enough to share some process sketches and below is the cover on the NYT website! Holding this thing in-hand walking around town definitely gets some looks.
It’s magnetic!

Is that pink? In person it’s practically hot to the touch. I think it’s radioactive. SUCH a strong move for the magazine, their covers are always amazing, thought-provoking and mesmerizing. This case is no exception, it’s quite fun to find new elements in this piece. It belongs on a wall, in a frame. They type, the weirdness, the childlike enthusiasm, all swirling around that amazing question so many people have been asking. Staring at this cover yesterday probably influenced my decision to watch Secret of My Success starring Michael J Fox last night on Netflix, which contains probably the most well known limo scene in film history. Will, did you listen to “Oh Yeah” by Yello during ANY of these drawings? Be honest.

In addition to scoring on this editorial piece made of dreams and talent, Will has a complete catalogue of kick ass illustrations, drawings, artwork, and design pieces under his belt. Is this what you call prolific? Is it any wonder that he studied and works very closely with Kate Bingaman-Burt? No surprise at all. One could do a series on all of Kate’s former students. It wold be long, and awesome.

Check out some of this work! Will famously says “I make stuff because I get sad if I don’t.” Amen.

More on his website, blog, and twitter.

The above 2 pieces were done for Kitsune Noir before Bobby changed his blog name to The Fox is Black. They were for a desktop wallpaper series that I think is still going on – I remember being in school and seeing these and realizing how awesome they were. It’s fun to have as a friend someone that you look up to and was part of your design education. That makes Will sound really old. In fact I think I’m older than he is. Suffice to say Will has been making dope work for years!

Will came to Portland in November of 2010 and had a solo show at Land Gallery, which was excellent and amazing simultaneously: