Illustrator J. Oval was a Brit named Ben Ostrick who painted under both his pseudonym and real name. His crisp illustrations helped make Pan Books, which debuted in 1944, one of the most eye-catching mid-century imprints. Pan is still around as part of Britain-based Macmillan Publishers, which is in turn owned by the Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group of Germany. Many of Oval’s pieces for Pan were paired with works so obscure they’re almost impossible to find today, but above you see a good-sized collection, including a few we managed to turn up that haven’t been widely seen. With few exceptions they all use the same formula, though he would occasionally deviate by painting a fully rendered background, or populating a scene with more than one or two figures. You can see a couple more Oval covers in our collection of Asia-influenced paperback art here, and we also shared a small collection of his work back in 2011 that you can find here. 

Above, five pulp pieces from illustrator J. Oval, including Ronald Kirkbride’s bestseller A Girl Named Tamiko (with its suspiciously non-Japanese-looking cover subject), and two from Sergeanne Golon’s famed Angélique series. Sergeanne Golon was actually a pseudonym for French author Anne Golon and her Russian husband/historical researcher Serge, aka Vsevolod Sergeïvich Goloubinoff. J. Oval was a pseudonym for artist Ben Ostrick, who was a major illustrator of both books and magazine articles in the 1950s and 1960s. These covers are circa late 1958 to 1962.