Al Jaffee’s Famous Fold-Ins

On April 10, 2023, cartoon artist Al Jaffee passed away at 102 years old. At a time when magazines were spending money on colorful, fold‑out centerfolds (Playboy, Life, Sports Illustrated, National Geographic), Jaffee subverted the idea by creating the black and white fold‑in. After four years, the fold-ins were produced in color, but Jaffee was the sole artist to draw them for Mad Magazine for 55 years. In 2007, he was honored with cartooning’s top honor, the Reuben Award, previously awarded to Charles M. Schulz, Gary Larson, and Matt Groening, among others. In 2016, he was honored with a Guinness World Record for longest career as a cartoon artist.

Jaffee’s fun and interactivity fold‑ins are referenced in pop culture from time to time. A few episodes of The Simpsons show the gag, a unique New York Times crossword in 2010 could be folded in, and Beck’s “Girl” music video from 2005 featured the technique several times, sometimes as entire moving sets.

Mad Magazine, Sept. 1971

Mad Magazine, June 2013, Unpublished

This fold-in was retracted because it accidentally coincided with the initially planned start of the court trial of Aurora, CO, movie theater shooter James Holmes. The magazine was pulled before the magazine hit shelves, pulped, and reprinted with an alternate fold-in. A few, rare copies still exist though. It was finally published in the June 2019 issue, the second to last issue of Mad that Jaffee worked on.

Mad Magazine, June 2016

Mad Magazine, Dec. 1990

Mad Magazines pop up every once in a while in TV and film. Believe it or not, a Mad Magazine even appears in the second season of Twin Peaks (a continual obsession of mine). Only an eagle-eyed viewer would have seen the magazine, which featured Bart Simpson on the cover, sitting on a coffee table. That issue featured the following fold‑in:

1997 DC Holiday Card

Jaffee’s fold-ins were not exclusively in Mad Magazine, and they didn’t always follow the format of the second half of the page folding into quarters on top of itself. Some of his earliest fold-ins folded diagonally. This DC holiday card still folds on the half mark, but the other fold is more 35/65 (instead of 50/50).

The Final Jaffee Fold-In

At 99, Jaffee’s final fold-in appeared in Mad’s August 2020 issue (show below). He created back in 2014 in anticipation of his retirement, though it seemed quite prescient due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Future magazines featured fold-ins by artist Johnny Sampson.

Interactive fold-in effect based on code by Thomas Park.