Biography
Irving Block (1910–1986) was an American painter, illustrator, visual-effects artist and screenwriter. He began his film career in the 1940s at 20th Century Fox as a matte-shot artist and later provided special effects and designs, often in collaboration with Jack Rabin and Louis DeWitt, for numerous low-budget science-fiction and horror films of the 1950s.
Block co-wrote the original story, with Allen Adler, for the 1956 MGM film Forbidden Planet, on which he is also credited with production design work. He contributed to other films including Kronos (1957), War of the Satellites (1958), The Atomic Submarine (1959) and The Giant Behemoth (1959). He is noted for concept work on the robot character Robby.
From 1963 to 1980 Block was a professor of art at California State University, Northridge. He continued to paint and exhibit throughout his life.
