Having always shared an interest in both Art and Science, David Hardy first worked in a laboratory, then illustrated his first book, for Patrick Moore, in 1954 at the age of 18. After service in the RAF he joined the Design Office of Cadbury's, near his home, where he obtained a thorough grounding in commercial art, airbrush illustration, typography and graphic design. After being asked to work on the film 2001, he left to go freelance in 1965, and is now widely acclaimed internationally as a leading space, SF and scientific artist.

He has since illustrated hundreds more books and magazines, produced backgrounds for stage productions at the London Palladium, illustrations for television (The Sky at Night, Horizon, Tomorrow's World, Cosmos, etc.) and video productions, computer games and packaging, production art for movies (including The Neverending Story ) and many 360^o panoramas for the London and Stuttgart planetaria. He has lectured and held many exhibitions internationally. His major book with Patrick Moore was Challenge of the Stars (Mitchell Beazley, 1972, revised 1978). Hardy is a Fellow and former President of the International Association of Astronomical Artists (IAAA), and has visited Iceland, Hawaii, Chile, the Galapagos Islands, etc. for reference material. His work was featured in the prestigious US-based magazine Step-by-Step Graphics, and he has written articles for New Scientist etc., as well as being a frequent illustrator for Focus and other magazines.

Fact to Fiction. It was in 1969, just as fiction became fact with the first Moon-landing, that Hardy's first science fiction work was published. He rapidly became established as a cover illustrator, producing covers for most UK publishers and all the major US magazines - Galaxy, If, Amazing, and, especially, Analog and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, for which he still produces covers. He has been nominated for a Hugo (SF's Oscar), for the British Science Fiction Association's Award for artwork and the US 'Lensman' Award, and has been voted 'Best European SF Graphic Artist'. He began to write and illustrate his own science-fact books in 1974, on subjects related to science, astronomy, astronautics, earth sciences, energy, etc. - seven to date, including Atlas of the Solar System (Heinemann 1982/Octopus, 1986). Hardy's major work to date is Visions of Space, published by Dragon's World in 1989/90. This has been highly acclaimed as 'the definitive book on space art', and includes the work of 72 international space artists, dating back to 1874. His book The Fires Within: Volcanoes on Earth and Other Planets (Dragon's World, 1991), has text by leading volcanologist Dr John Murray. In September 2001 an art book about Hardy's life and work, Hardyware, was published by Paper Tiger (price ?20, hardcover), with text by Chris Morgan.

His painting 'Terraforming Mars' was selected for inclusion on a CD-ROM sent on the Mars 96 mission, and also forms the cover for Arthur C. Clarke's book The Snows of Olympus (Gollancz, 1995), while a companion piece, 'Terra Nova', forms the cover art for the late Carl Sagan's A Pale Blue Dot (Random House, 1995). This is also available as a fine art print, published by Novagraphics in the USA, and available from AstroArt.. Hardy's work is widely featured in The Encyclopedia of Fantasy & Science Fiction Art Techniques (Titan, 1996). It has also been used in advertising, up to 48-sheet posters. He was chosen to illustrate the 'Millennium Planet' - a newly discovered extrasolar world, in December 1999, which appeared in the world's press and TV.

AstroArt. Following David Hardy's first one-man exhibition at the London Planetarium in 1968, the fine art print Stellar Radiance was published by Rosenstiel's, and became the first and only space art print ever to reach the annual Top Ten Prints list, at No. 6, in 1970. Other prints followed, and AstroArt was formed to handle the sales of these, which it still does, as well as originals and its 6x6cm transparency library.

Computer Art. For the last ten years David has been producing artwork digitally, using a PowerMac G4 500 with programs such as Photoshop 6, sending the images to publishers on CD or by Internet.. A 'digital portfolio' is available on request, and a CD ScreenSaver for Windows and Mac is published by Second Nature Software (USA, available in the UK from AstroArt).

In 2003 an asteroid was named after him, and his first novel, AURORA, was published (Cosmos Books)

The Official Paper Tiger Web Site (Publisher)

David A. Hardy Books at Amazon

David A. Hardy's Website