Show & tell 7.0: I'll tell a tale to you

The first fairy tales I ever heard came from an anthology of LPs popular in the 1970s, Let's Pretend: 1 LP, 2 stories (one on side A, one on side B). Although the stories are traditional, the series was re-adapted from a children's radio show created by Nila Mack that aired in the late 1920s through the mid 1950s. My memories of these stories have a strong visual element that no radio broadcast could ever convey. Of course, a story-telling album endeavors to inspire children to use their imagination and picture things for themselves; but the artwork on these record covers is so extraordinary that it informed not only my ideas of the faces and places of these classic fables, it also informed my most basic understanding of form, line, movement, silhouette and color. The artwork for the entire series of 25 records was created by David Chestnutt (a mysterious fellow, though I think his more recent work can be found here). The style is quintessentially psychedelic, calling upon conventions that had already been established by the artists of the Fillmore and Family Dog Productions in California, Push Pin Studios in New York, and the Beatles-associated Dutch design collective helmed by Marijke Koger known as The Fool. Even though these came into my consciousness when I was very young, these illustrations are the center of my grown-up visual ethos .... and that's about the biggest compliment I can muster.