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Pennywise from Stephen King’s IT is the reason why generations of readers and moviegoers are afraid of clowns. He’s not representative of a nightmare. He is the nightmare. This makes portrayals of this particular clown quite challenging to pull off. How do you capture the very source of a phobia (coulrophobia to be exact) in the modern age? It’s only the highest expression of that fear we’re talking about here.
London-based book publisher Folio Society asked itself this very question in preparation for the release of a limited-edition run of IT. The answer lied in hiring award-winning artist Jim Burns to produce 11 double-page black and white illustrations and 6 double-page color illustrations based on the book.
Burns is considered one of the Grandmasters of sci-fi art thanks to his near photo-realistic vistas of future worlds and giant spaceships. Many consider his illustrations for the Harry Harrison book Mechanismo to be among his very best. His vision blends classic sci-fi sensibilities with more sensuous inclinations, when the image calls for it. The future Burns imagines feels real enough to live in. It embraces the weird just enough to invite the fantastical without taking it too far away from the realm of plausibility.
Folio launched the book on July 15th, 2025, which also features an introduction by Guillermo del Toro. As of the time of this writing, it is sold out. The book’s run was limited to 500 copies and it carried a cost of $850. Given the popularity of the story and its iconic monster, it’s not surprising that supply dried out so quickly the very first day it was available for purchase. Maybe a second printing is in order? Clearly, the demand is there.
Like other Folio books, IT has been carefully designed to capture the horror King introduced to the world in 1986. The outer layer (cover, spine, and page edges) is covered in broad strokes of red that simulate blood, making the physical object look like it was used as a murder weapon (along with some abstract terror images spread throughout). It’s indicative of the violence contained within. Those who’ve read King’s classic know there are a lot of nasty little things that didn’t make it to the movies. The blood is justified.
The Beat corresponded with Burns to talk process, fear, and the importance of honoring the nightmare clown that haunts so many till this day.
Stacked from 5 images. Method=B (R=8,S=4)RICARDO SERRANO: We have two very popular adaptations of IT already out there, both with iconic interpretations of Pennywise and the kids that face him. How did you approach the world of the book, and its monstrous clown, to create your version?
JIM BURNS: Obviously I know the films and both in their own ways are indeed ‘iconic’. Having re-watched them for the project as well as actually reading the book for the first time (as well as listening to an unabridged version on Audible), I realized that the movies can’t really explore things in quite the same depth but one or two of my early ideas with regard to how to depict Pennywise in a more disconcerting way had to be pushed aside really as time was very limited on this project. In the movies what you see down the storm drain is a clown, pure and simple. An evil clown for sure, but still a clown. So for instance I did discuss early on with Folio that it might be a nice idea to show Pennywise as part clown and part something horribly ‘cosmic’ and extraterrestrial… so an initial idea — that of him in the storm drain but shown in profile with a clown profile — with the back of his head and body… the parts not visible to Georgie… being spidery and with strange vaguely suggested spiny limb-like appendages. But whilst that might have worked with a bit of time and application, in the end progress had to be made with some speed, so a more conventional road was followed. I was certainly keen to try and bring something a little different to the project.
SERRANO: What aspects of the book did you want to capture that perhaps weren’t as prevalent in the movies?
BURNS: Again — and I hate to keep referring to this — time constraints did get in the way somewhat of what might have been a deeper dive into the book. But it was decided early on that the black and whites in particular should focus mostly on detailed depictions of the shapeshifted creations of IT reflecting the particular fears that the members of ’The Losers Club’ were individually traumatized by. So there is a considerable focus on those separate monstrous apparitions that IT is able to conjure in the kids’ imaginations… so nicely detailed depictions of the mummy, the leper, the werewolf, the doberman-headed clown, etc. I wanted to make more of this aspect of the book than I think is realized in the movies.
SERRANO: You have a distinct vision for fantasy and science fiction that blends the classics with more modern stylings. There’s a sense of realism to them that makes the fantastical seem plausible. Did you bring any of those sensibilities to IT?
BURNS: I hope so. I’ve always strived to bring a sense of conviction to my work, so that the impossible and otherworldly can be sensed as real. It’s a bit of a personal obsession and in following this road I think sometimes I made a bit of a rod for my back down the years! But that is my personal obsession, and this book was never going to be any different. Again, time meant that I wasn’t able to indulge myself over long stretches of time to try and perfect that side of it, but I think I made a fair go of it. I like the idea of an image as a sort of snapshot — a frozen moment in an ongoing narrative — and that was something I was trying for with ‘IT’ in the same way I always do.
SERRANO: How has working with Folio Society informed your own creative process?
BURNS: Certainly if more of this kind of work came my way then the lessons learned — that of working faster and finding short cuts within limited time frames — have encouraged me to look at some new experimental ways with media, ways that might speed up my work process. So exploring in greater depth the idea of working in pen or pencil and then digitally colorizing, as I did with my work for Suntup when I illustrated Orwell’s 1984. I think I have to extend my digital capabilities in order to not be driven insane by masses of physical work in short order! The coal face of the easel can be a harsh mistress! This book along with 1984 are pretty much a new kind of venture for me… namely illustrating all the internals for a specific job. Mostly over the 50-odd years I’ve been doing this stuff it’s been book jackets, but this feels like a new lease of life — and one for which I’m very grateful. It has certainly excited me and encouraged me to explore new methods and techniques — at a time in life when I was imagining I was going to be winding down a bit!
English (US)