THE GOLDEN AGE OF

• ttl-

BOOK ONE

E 0 T li E T I o_u E FETISH & BIZA RR E

--- L:::;::&-*~ -

E 0 T li E T 1 o_u E FETISH & BIZARRE

Jar Soplzislica!ed

collectors o/ !lze

Zlnusual

THE GOLDEN AGE OF

•

tn-BOOK ONE

Text by Alberto Becattini

GLITTERING

IMAGES edizio ni d 'essai

Above: Gil Elvgren, plate from his 1952 Brown & Bigelow calendar. Gag: «I'm not shy. I'm just retiring." © Brown & Bigelow Half·tltle page: Original cover art by Peter Driben for Whisper magazine. Vol. 5 # 3, November 1951 . Counter-frontispiece: Pin-up by Joyce Ballantyne, ca. 1958. Frontispiece: Sunny Side Up. Pin-up by Gil Eivgren. © Brown & Bigelow

C he cos'e lapin-up art? Prendendo il tennine alta lettera, dovrebbe far parte a buon diritto di questo ambi­

toartistico ogni immagine femminile dipin­ra (con tecniche c he vanno dal pastello alia tempera, dall'acqucrcllo all'olio) concepita peressereappesa al muro- come un poster, dunque, o come un calendario. Una pin-up, per dirsi tale, deve avcre caraueristiche ben precise: tra queste, Ia particolare postura della ragazza ritratta, che dovra necessa­riamente esscrc scnsuale; o gli indumcnti indossati dalla ragazza, che dovranno con­Uibuire (lasciando sapicmemcnte scoperte, o facendo trasparire, parti "calde" del suo corpo) a "erotizzare" ulterionnente l'imma­gine. Secondo alcuni, Ia pin-up "ortodossa" e quclla chc csclude Ia presenza dell'ele­mento maschilc come pure di ogni altro elemento "estraneo", pred i I igendo uno sfon­do bianco che fa della ragazza l'unica prota­gonista dell'immagine. Piccole concessioni al "contesto" possono essere rappresentate, sc mai, da e lemcnti "funzionali" quali ma­rionette dalla foggia maschile (che simbo­leggino il controllo, da parte della pin-up, sull'uomo-osscrvatore), cagnolini (che, con illoro agitarsi, possano provocare il sollc­vamento delle gonne delle I oro padroncine),

oppure oggetti di vario generc (i quali ab­biano, se possibile, connotazioni falliche). Noi non ci sentiamo di csserc cos! cate­gorici, e ritcniamo ou im i esempi di pin-up art anche le immag ini "contestualizzate" (accompagnate, cioe, da un background e/o dalla prescnza di un personaggio maschile), purche l'elemento fc mminile ne resti indi­scusso protagonista e conservi il carisma e Ia sensualita di cui s i diceva sopra. Rien-

Pin-ups by Enoch Bolles (top) and Earl Moran (above;© Brown & Bigelow).

trano dunque- a nostro parere- nell 'or­todossla de lle pin-ups anche queUe imma­gini chc-una volta estrapola te dal medium cui era no state in originedcstinate (lacoper­tina di un libro, per cscmpio, oppure di un alboa fumetti)-possanocsscrc tranquilla­mente appuntate ad una parctc, magari al­l'inremo di un'elcgante cornice. In q ues to volume ci propon iamo di tracciare un'agi le storia della pin-up art negli Stati Uniti, con un accento particolarc sui suoi "anni d 'oro", idcntificabili con il periodo chc va dal 1940 ai primi anni '60. Parleremo di riviste, calcndari, paperbacks, c soprat­tullo ricorderemo i princ ipali autori che riversarono gran parte del !oro talento in questo particolarissimo ambito artistico. In questo nostro viaggio ci accompagneranno quelle stcsse, bcllissime immagini che han­no fa tto sognare intcrc generazioni, ncl cui policromo marc - per citare uno dci nostri massimi pocti - ci sara sempre dolce il naufragare.

W hat is pin-up art? Literally, a pin­up should beagirl painting(done in such techniques as pastels,

gouache, watercolours , or oils) conceived to be hung on a wall - like a poster, or a ca­lendar. Yet a pin-up, to deserve this name, must have precise characteristics: these include the painted girl's posture, which has necessarily to be sensual; or the clothes the girl is wearing, which will contribute (by deliberate! y uncovering or revealing, thanks to their transparency, the "hotter" parts of her body) to make the image more erotic.

PIN UP ART 5

Cover featuring Betty Grable from Movie Story Magazine, December 1942.

Model Joan Stevens from the Beauty Parade centerfold, July 1951.

6 ESTHET I QCE

BAKE UP AND

LIVE

George Quintana, September 1937.

According to some experts, the "orthodox" pin-up painting has 10 exclude the presence of a male partner, as well as any other "alien" elemenL The background has to be white, thus making the girl the sole protago­nist of the picture. Some "functional" props may be accepted , such as male-shaped puppets (which symbolize the pin-up's control over the male observer), puppies (which often cause their mistresses' skirts -as well as our blood pressure- to rise), or certain kinds of objects (which have evident phallic implications). We would not be that strict, and think that "contextuali­zed" images (that is, including a background, and/or the presence of a male figure) may be excellent examples of pin-up art, provided that the girl remains the protagonist of the picture, keeping her charisma and sensuali­ty intact. Thus, in our opinion, the pin-up "orthodoxy" may also include those images which -after being isolated from the me­dium they had originally been painted for (a book, or a comic book cover, for instance) - can easily be hung on a wall, whether fra­med or not. The purpose of this book is to give readers an overview of pin-up art in the United States, with a focus on its "Golden Years" (circa 1940 - Early 1960's). We will discuss magazines, calendars, paperbacks, and -most of all - we will remember many of those talented artists who made this peculiar genre great. It will be, we hope, a fascina­ting dream-journey through an ocean of multi-coloured images. And if our ship should sink, we will be more than happy 10

drown.

Q u'est-<:e que l'art pin-up? Si l'on prend cetlC forme d'exprcssion ar­tistique a Ia !cure, toute image de

femme que l'on a peinte scion des techni­ques qui vom du pastel a Ia gouache, de l'aquarelle a Ia peinture a l'huile, con~ue pour etre accrochee au mur - com me l'af­fiche ou com me Ie calendricr- devrait ju­stement pouvoir cntrer dans ce domaine ar­tistique. Pour qu'on l'appelle ainsi, une pin­up, doit possecter des caracteristiques bien precises: l'aUirude tout a fait particuliere de la jeune fille sera necessairement scnsue lle, ou bien les vetements pon~s par celle-ci contribueront a rendre !'illustration encore plus ~rotique (en devoilant savarnmant ou en faisant entrevoir par transparence, Ies zones "chaudes" de son corps). Selon cer­tains, Ia pin-up "onhodoxe" est celle qui exclutla presence de I' element masculin, de meme que tout autre element "~tranger" et qui privilegie ainsi un fond blanc, faisant de

Above left: Pin-up by Ted Withers for an Artist's Sketchbook Calendar.© Brown & Bigelow Above rig ht: Pin-up girl by Harry Ekman, ca.1958. Gag:« They tell me l"m a stand-out ... Left: Peter Driben, cover from Wink, Vol. 8 # 2, October 1952.

la jeune fille La seule hcro"ine de J'illustra­tion. Toutefois, des compromis au "contex­te" de pcu d'importance peuvent etre repre­semes par des elements "fonctionnels" tels que des marionnettes representant des hommes (qui symbolisent le contr6le, de la pan de Ia pin-up, sur l'homme-observateur), ou bien de tout petits chiens (qui, avec leurs mouvementscontinuels peuventsoulever la jupe de leur proprictaire), ou encore des objets hct.Croclites (qui possectent si possi­ble, des connotations phalliques). Quant a nous, nous ne voulons pas etre aussi catcgo­riques, et no us pensons que lcs images "con­textualisees" (c'est-a-dirc lcs imagesaccom­pagnees d'un background el/ou de Ia pre­sence d'un personnage masculin) sont de tres bons exemples de pin-up pourvu que l'element feminin rcstc Ie protagonistc in­conteste et qu'il conserve Ie charisme et Ia sensualite dont nous avons deja pari c. Scion nous, les illustrations qui- une fois extrai-

tes du medium auqucl ellesetaicnt dcstinees (La couverturc d'un livre, par excmplc, ou bien un album de BD)- peuvent etre tran­quillement accrochees au mur, voire enca­drees, rentrent tout a fait dans l'orthodoxie des pin-ups. Dans ce volume, nous nous proposons de presenter une breve histoire de l'illustration de Ia pin-up aux Et.ats-Unis, en insistant sur ses "annees de gloire" qui vont de 1940 jusqu'au debut des annees soixante. On pari era de revues, de calendriers, de paper­backs, et surtout on rappellera lcs princi­paux auteurs qui employerent une grande partie de leur talent dans ce domaine anisti­que. Durant notre voyage, cesontces memes trCS belles illustrations qui Ont fait rever d'entieres generations qui nous accompa­gncrom, dans Ia mer multicolore desquellcs il no us sera toujours agreable de no us laisser transporter au gre des vagues.

Pll\'" UP ART 7

Above: Original cover art by Peter Driben for Titter , Vol. 3 # 2, September 1946. Titter was one of Harrison's successful girlie magazines. Opposite: Cover by Hugh J . Ward for Spicy Adventure Stories (top); cover by Enoch Bolles (?) for Cupid's Capers, October 1933 (bottom).

8 ESTHETIQUE

Sexy Pulps & Girlie Magazines

F u intomo al 1877 c he, in Francia, sulle copcrtine di riviste qual i La Vie Parisienne, presero ad apparire

con regolarit.A illusl.l'aZioni colorate d.i belle ragazze in des habille. n principale au tore di queste immagini in fondo innocenti rna nonilimeno stimo lanli - soprattutlO per il pubblico del tempo - era Rapha~l Kirch­ner. II suo escmpio venne seguito da molti altri taJentosi artisli, tra i quali C. Hc rouard, George Barbier, Pierre Brissaud e I' "oriun­do" Umbcno Brunelleschi (nato a Monte­murlo, in Toscana, nel 1879), e si iliffusero testate quali Le Journal Amusant, Gai-Pa­ris oLe Sourire, che si rifacevano aperta­mente al modcllo de La Vie Parisienne. Rapha~l Kirchner divenne il vero e p roprio profeta della nconata pin-up art, e la sua farna varco l'occano: nel 19 16, !'impresario teatrale F lorenz Ziegfeld lo incarico di decorare con Je sue inimitabili illustrazioni il foyer delle celebri Follies di Broadway. Negli Stati Uniti, i primi esempi di riviste che riprcndcvano - pur senza raggiun­geme Ia finezza - Ia fo rmula de La Vie Parisienne, apparvero a ll'iniz io della Prima Guerra Mondiale. II loro scopo era, almeno inizialmeme, quello di tirar su i I morale dei soldati al fronte, proponendo tutta una serie di panels umoris lici accompagnati da gags ammiccanti. Captain Billy's Whiz Bang (fondato da Will iam H. Fawcett, uno de i nomi piu importanti dell'cditoria statuniten­se), Jim Jam Jem e il Calgary Eye-Opener furono alcuni dei titoli piu diffusi. Ma lo spinto delle rivistc franccsi, e l'aunosfera libcrtina della Parigi "anni '20" venncro piu fede lmente importati da riviste dai titoli "gallici" quali Parisian Life, Gay Parisien-

ne, La Paree Stories, Paris Nights, Gay French Life, French Night Life e French Scandals. Queste ed altrc magazines come Snappy,Spicy Stories, Bedtime Stories, Pep, Gayety o Breezy Stories- part.icolarmentc diffuscacavallo tragli anni '20egli anni '30 grazie a cditori quali Frank Munsey e Wil­liam M. Clayton - sono collcuivamcnte idemificate come sexy pulps o girlie pulps. Laddove i pulps tradizionali veicolavano letteratura popolare di stampo avvcnturoso (dal weste rn al mystery, dall'esotico al fan­tascientifico), i sexy pulps proponevano racconti in testa a sfondo romantico-eroli­co, accompagnati da illustrazio ni in bianco e nero solitamente rcaliz.zate in uno stile

cartoonyche si rifaceva a quello del celebre John Held,jr. (il quale, peraltro, era stato tra

i primi collaboratori di Snappy). Alcuni titoli , quali Stolen Sweets o Taule Tales, includevano anche fotografic di nudi fem­minili. Nel contcsto della pin-up art, i sexy pulps ri vesLOno una particolarc importanza: il loro "pezzo forte" erano infatli le poli­crome illustrazioni di copcrtina, realizzatea tempera, che ritraevano un unico soggcuo femminile (solitamente su sfondo bianco, per farlo risaltare maggiormcnte) in pose "studiate" permetteme in evidenza le fogge curvilinee. Un particolare accento veniva messo sulle gam be (tanlO che qucsLO tipo di figurazione e ancoroggi noto come leg art), che apparivano ora nude, ora inguainatc in que lle calzc di nylon che per illc ttorc dell'e­poca rappresentavano un fortissimo richia­mo sessuale. Chiari riferimenli feticistici era no, del resLO, presenti in testate quali Silk Stocking Fun o High Heel Magazine. Du­rante gli anni della Grande Depressione, quelle riviste rappresentarono, con le !oro invitanti copertinee con le I o ro s toriclle pic­canti, un buon divers ivo per l'americano medio, affiillO da quotidiani problemi di 50-pravvivenza. Gli cditori, da parte loro, cer­cavano di venire incontro ai le tLOri o ffrendo fino a cinque titoli diversi in abbonamento trimestrale cumulativo per 3,75 dollari -corrispondenli alia paga media di tre giomi. Sulla stessa linea delle riviste appcna citate, rna con uno specifico riferimento al mondo del cinema eai suoi re troscena, si collocava­no testate quali Film Fun, Movie 1/umor, Movie Merry-Go-Round eSaucy Movie Ta­les. II principale copeninista di sexy pulps durante gli anni '20 e '30 fu Enoch Bolles, il

PI:\" U P ART 9

Hugh J . Ward, November 1934.

quale seppe creare- in uno stile voluta­mente sospeso tra il realistico e il caricalU­rale - un modello d i provocante femmini­lita. carallerizzato da una larga bocca -quasi sempre aperta in un sorriso ammic­cante e incomiciata cia un rossetto intenso -edaocchi semichiusi,cclati da un trucco pcsante. A rincarare Ia dose di erotismo delle figurazioni di Bolles, e finanche a suggerire che Ia pin-up stesse mimando un rapporto sessuale, provvedeva poi Ia co­stante presenza di oggetti piil o meno espli­cit.amente fallici (selle, innaffiatoi, ancore, spade, ecc.). Degni "seguaci" di Bolles fu­rono George Quintana, Ray A. Burley, Earle K. Bergey e Peter Driben. Di alcuni di loro avremo modo di riparlare piu oltre. La prcsenza femminile fu semprc costante anche sulle copertine dei pulps "avventuro­si", e in alcuni casi si puo parlare a huon diritto di pin-up art: si vcdano, ad csempio, leardite, inquietanti figurazionidi Margaret Brundage per Weird Tales ( 1932-45), le curvilinee ragazze spaziali ritratte da Earle Bergey per Litoli fantascientifici quali Star­tling Stories (c. l939-50) o Captain Future (1941-45), o ledamsels in distress spogliate e vinimizzatecla maniaci escienziati pazzi, ritraue cia William Reusswig, John Newton Howitt, Charles Blaine, Rafael M. DeSoto edaltri per Dime Detective Magazine,Dime Mystery Magazine, Terror Tales, Horror Stories, Romantic Detective, Private Detec­tive Stories ed altre testate consimili, pub­blicate soprauutto dalla Popular Publica­tions e clalla Trojan Publishing. Fu proprio quest'ultima casa editrice, che aveva Ia sua sede a Wilmington, nel Delaware, a lancia­re, nell'aprile del 1934, i cosiddetti spicy pulps, che proponevano racconti ne i quali l'avventura e Ia suspense procedevano di pari passo con Ia violenza e l'erotismo.

10 ESTH ETIQUE

Artist Unknown, May 1940.

Fondatoredella Trojan (altrimenti nota come Culture Publications), fu quell'Harry Do­ncnfeld (1898-1965) che, tra il 1937 e il 1964, sarebbe stato titolare della DC Co­mics, Ia casa editrice chc ancor oggi pubbli­ca i comic books di Superman e Batman. II nome di Doncnfeld, tuttavia, non apparve mai sulle pubblicazioni della Trojan/Cultu­re: egli si riscrvo il piu "confonevole" ruolo di silent partner, lasciando che fosse il suo socio Frank Armer a figurare come cditore di Spicy Detective, Spicy Western Stories, Spicy Mystery e Spicy Adventure Swries. Gli spicy pulps conobbero illoro maggior fu1gore tra il 1934 e i1 1938, prima che i censori costringessero Donenfe ld e Armer a mitigame i comcnuti. Le Storie avventu­roso-erotiche (scritte da au tori quali Robert

Charles Bla10e, Apnl 1936.

Artist Unknown, July/August 1937.

Leslie Bellem, Henry Kuttner. Hugh Cave, c persino da quel Robcn E. Howard che aveva crcato il barbara Conan) vennero ben sintctiz.zatc graficamcnte nelle copenine a tempera (che ritracvano di solito belle ra­gazze discinte, minacciate cia dcmoniache presenze o cia criminali sadici) realizzate con pig I io real istico cia artisti di val ore asso­luto quali Hugh J . Ward (rispettabile illu­stratore di riviste "serie" quali Liberty) e Harry Parkhurst, che anticiparono a tratli il filone feticistico-bondage in auge a parlire da1 secondo dopoguerra. Nel gennaio del 1943, semprc pill bcrsagliati dalla ccnsura, Armere Donenfeld deciscro di trasformare radicalmente i loropulps, sostituendo l'inte­stazione Spicy con Ia piu neutra Speed (fino a chiudcre definitivamente i battcnti nel 1950). L'era degli spicy pulps era fin ita, rna per fonuna ne era appena iniziata un'altra: quella delle girlie magazines di Roben Harrison. La carricra g iomaJistica di Robert Harrison ebbe inizio negli anni '20, quando -ancora adolescente- lavorava presso il quotidia­no scandalisticoNew York Graphic. Anche se dovette accontentarsi di servire da fauo­rino, negli anni trascorsi al Graphic Harri­son imparo un sacco di cose sui giomali­smo, e soprattuuo sulle immense potenzia­lita commerciali della stampa scandalistica. Nei primi mcsi del 1942, nel suo modesto bilocale Harrison deue vita-con Ia prezio­sa assistenza d i Earl Moran, grande "piuore di donnine"-a un nuovo tipo di pubblica­zione, interamente dcdicata allcpin-ups. Le sue48 pagine, infarcitedi servizi fotografici in bianco e nero con magnifichc ragazze in "due pezzi" o lingerie (servizi nei quali lo stesso Harrison compariva di quando in quando come "figurante"), giustificavano appieno il titolo della rivista: Beauty Pa-

•

George Quintana, March 1934.

rade- Glorifying the American Girl. L'A­merica era enuata in guerra da pochi mcsi, e-comegitleraaccadutoaJie riv isLC "scol­lacciate" dcgli anni '10- i soldati costi tui­rono (almcno all'inizio) una fetta considcre­vole dci leuori di Beauty Parade. Per Ie copertinc - anche per evitare guai con Ia censura - Harrison penso bene di non usarc fOlo, rna prefer! continuare Ia tradi.do­ne delle painted covers, e lo fcce assicuran­dosi prima di tutto i servigi di quell'ottimo PeLCr Dribcn che, nella seconda melt~ degli anni '30, avcva abbell itocon le sue tcmpere lecopertinedi riviste quali Gay Parisienne, High /lee/ Magazine, Movie 1/wn()r, Silk Stocking Stories eSpicy Stories. Lasciando­si aJie spaJie Ia stiliu..azione (alia lunga un po' sLCrcotipata) di Enoch Bolles, rna rima-

George Quintana(?), July 1937.

George Quintana, October 1935.

nendo largamente fcdele ai canoni della leg art per quel cheauienealle posture delle sue girls, Driben prcsc a rcalizzare tutta una ser iedi magnilici ritratti femminili,e via via che Harrison aggiungeva nuovi tiLOl i al suo cornet- con Tiller ( 1944), Eyeful ( 1944), Wink (1945), Whisper ( l941) eFlirt( 1948), tutti pubblicati con cadenza bimestrale ­Dribcn prcndeva a dipingcmc le copcrtine, affiancato - piu o meno sahuariamente­da Moran (chc si firmava Steffa, essendo sot to contratto con Brown & Bigelow) e dal bravo Billy DeVorss (aulOre, scmpre negli anni '40, anche di molti calendari e poster per Brown & Bigelow). Nonostante Harri­son potesse contarc (sin dal 1951) su una modclla d'eccezione come Betty Page, le sue girlie rrUJgazines non rcssero il confron-

Peter Driben, December 1937.

George Quintana (?), April 1933.

to con i l patinato, coloratissimo Playboy di Hugh Hefner, e dovcttero capitolare alia melt~ degli anni '50. Harrison, comunque, aveva un asso nella manica: nel diccmbre del 1952 aveva inauguralO una nuova LCsta­ta, Ia scandalistica Confidential. La rivista, chc rapprescntava per molti versi Ia "cattiva coscienza" dcii'Amcricadi Eiscnhowcr,parti con una tiratura di 250.000 copie per arriva­rca vcndcme finoaquattro milioni a nume­ro, c Harrison divenne un vero c proprio per­sonaggio, per quanto "scomodo". Sopran­nominato "The King of Leer" (leueralmcnLC "il rc della sbirciata", rna c evidentc l'asso­nanza con "K ing Lear". lo shakespcariano re Lear), l'cditore viaggiava a bordo di una lussuosa Cadillac bianca, frcqucntava i ri­trovi piu in, e vcniva regolarmente invi tato

r~olErt S October, l93S ~· 35~ IUEE1

Artist Unknown, October 1937.

P I N UP ART 11

sliltlE;lilES 25* .JUNE 1933

IilES sliiii.E;IA•ES 25* AUGUST 1933

Exoticism on some covers from Tattle Tales, a spicy pulp magazine of the Thirties. Illustrations by Artist(s) Unknown.

ai talk shows televisivi. Almcno fino aHa fine dcgli anni '50, allorchC le protcste di colora i quali si scmivano danneggiati dalle malevole "chiacchiere" di Confidential (in primo luogo, molti attori hollywoodiani), non costrinsero Harrison prima a fare aLto di contrizione e a cambiare radicalmente l 'im­postazione della rivista, ed in fine ad abban­donare il campo cditoriale.

I twasaround 1877 that,onthecoversof such French magazines as La Vie Pari­sienne, stancd to regularly appear co­

lour illustrations of scantily-dressed beauti­ful girls. The main author of these basically

Cover from Tattle Tales. July 1933.

12 EST HE T l QUE

innocent yet exciting (especially at that time) images was Raphael K irchncr. His example was followed by scveraJ other taJented ar­tists, like C. Hcrouard, George Barbier, Pierre Brissaud, and by one ItaJian artist, Umbcno Brunelleschi (who had moved to Paris from native Montcmurlo, Tuscany, where he had been born in 1879). Other titles started to appear, including LeJournal Amusant, Gai-Paris or Le Sourire, which were directly inspired to La Vie Parisienne. Kirchner became the real prophet of the newborn pin-up art, and his fame reached New York, where Broadway impresario R orenz Ziegfcld asked him ( 19 I 6) to deco­rate the haJis of his Follies with his inimita­ble illustrations. In the United States, early examples of magazines which imported the Vie Pari­sienne formula (without reaching iL<; classy levels)appearcd during WW I. InitiaJiy, they were designed to cheer up soldiers by offe­ring them a whole collection of spicy car­toons. Captain Billy's Whiz Bang (founded by William H. Fawcett, one of the most important US publishers),JimJemJam and the Calgary Eye-Opener were among the best-known titles. Yet the spirit which ani­mated the French magazines, and Lhe liber­tine atmosphere of Paris in the Twenties, .were more fail.hfully represented in such "Gallic" titles as Parisian Life, Gay Pari­sienne,La Paree Stories. Paris Nights, Gay French Life, French Night Life, and French Scandals. These and olhcr magazines such as Snappy, Spicy Stories, Bedtime Stories, Pep , Gayety or Breezy Stories - which were extremely popular between the 1920's and 1930's, lhanks to such publ ishers as Frank Munsey and William M. Clayton­were collectively identified as "sexy pulps"

or "girlie pulps". Whereas traditionaJ pulps published popular adventurous literature (ranging from western to mystery, from exoticism to science-fiction), sexy pulps contained erotic-romantic text stories, ac­companied by black-and-white illustrations which were usually drawn in a canoony style reminiscent of John Held's (in fact, Held himself had been one of the nrst con­tributing artists). Some titles, l ike S10len Sweets or Taule Tales, also included nude girl photos. Within pin-up~ sexy pulps are very im­portant, on account of their cover iiJu­strations. Done in oi ls or watercolours,lhe­se ponrayed one female subject (whose

Cover from Tattle Tales, March 1934.

Famous history and literature women characters on cover. Artist(s) Unknown, Bedtime Stories, July, October and May 1933.

bright colours slOOd out against the white background), in suc h poses that emphasized the girl's curves. Legs were depicted with particular attention (which explains the "leg art" term used to refer to this kind of illustra­tion), both when they were naked, and when they were enwrapped in those nylon stoc­kings which represented a strong sexual lure for the reader. Clear fetishistic referen­ces were also prescm in such titles as Silk Stocking Fun or 1/igh //eel Magazine. During the Great Depression years, those magazines represented, with tl1e ir alluring covers and their spicy stories, a good di­straction for the average American, plagued

.JUNE DUBARRY 1933

Cover from Bedtime Stories, June 1933.

with daily survival problems. The publis­hers obviously tried to favour their readers by offering them cumulative subscriptions: in 1935, a three-month sub to five different titles costS 3.75 - corresponding 10 over three days' wages. On the same Line of the above-mentioned titles, yet with specific reference to the cinema and its backstage stories, were such magazines as Film Fun, Movie Humor, Movie Merry-Go-Round and Saucy Movie Tales . The main sexy pulp cover artist during the 1920's and 1930's was Enoch Bolles. He was able tocreate- usinga stylewhich was partly realistic, and partly ludicrous - a prototype of provoking femininity, cha­ral:terized with a large mouth - usually wide open in a tempting smile, and framed by a deep-red lipstick - as well as with half <losed eyes, concealed by a heavy make­up. The erotic impact o f Bolles's pictures, as well as the impression that the girl was mi­mimg a sex act, was enhanced by the con­stant presence of objects which were more or less explicitly phallic (saddles, watering­can~. ·anchors, swords, etc.). Among the better followers of Bolles's style there were George Quintana, Ray A. Burley, Earle K. Bergey, and Peter Dribcn. We will Later discuss some of them in detail. Painted girls were always present on the covers of adventure pulps, too, so that in some cases those paintings can be conside­red excellent examples of pin-up arL See, for example, Margaret Brundage's disquic­tmgly sexy covers for Weird Tales (1932-45).thr 'pace girls painted by Earle Bergey for Startlmg Stories (c.l939-50) or Captain Future (1941-45), or the damsels in distress stripped and tonured by maniacs or mad

scientists and painted by William Rcuss­wig, John Newton Howiu, Charles Blaine, Rafael M. DeSoto and many others for such titles as Dime Detective Magazine, Dime Mystery Magazine, Terror Tales, 1/orror Stories, Romantic Detective, and Private Detective Stories, which were mostly pu­blished by PopuLar Publications and Trojan Publishing. The latter publisher, located in Wilmington, Delaware, launched (April, 1934) Lhe so-called "spicy pulps", which contained stories which paired up adventure and suspense with violence and eroticism. The founder of Trojan (a.k.a. Culture Publi­cations) was Harry Donenfeld (1898-1965), the man who was at the head of DC Comics

Cover from Bedtime Stories, Feb. 1934.

PIN UP ART 13

Bathing beauty. Cover from Stolen Sweets, October 1933.

(ofSupennan and Baunan fame) from 1937 until 1964. YeL. Donenfeld's name never appeared in the Trojan/Culture magazines, as he preferred to act as a silent partner, leaving Frank Armer the official role of publisher of Spicy Detective, Spicy Western Stories, Spicy Mystery, and Spicy Adventu­re Stories. The spicy pulps were particular­ly popular between 1934 and 1938, before censorship forced Donenfeld and Armer to tone down their contents. The spirit of the adventure-erotic sLOries printed inside the magazines(written by suchauthorsasRobert Leslie Bellem, Henry Kuttner, Hugh Cave, and even by Conan crealOr Robert E. Ho­ward) was well synthesized in their painted covers (which usually depicted half-naked girls threatened by demons or sadistic cri -

14 ESTHETIQUE

minals), done in a strong realistic sty le by such great artists as Hugh J. Ward (a "re­spectable" i llustrator of slick magazines I ike Liberty} and Harry Parkhurst, who anticipa­ted the fetishistic-bondage genre, widely popular after WW2. In January, 1943, the slings and arrows of censorship convinced Anner and Donenfeld to radically transfonn their pulps, and they replaced the Spicy logo with the tamer Speed. By 1950, even the Speed line had come to an end. The spicy pulp era was over, yet another had just begun, thanks to Robert Harrison's girlie magazines. Harrison's career began in the earl y 1920's, when - still in his teens- he worked for the scandal newspaper New York Graphic. Even though he was only employed as a

HAVANA NIGHTS 1 THE BREAST STROKE bl<oa~ bi(A)Co...!l

Cover by Earle K. Bergey, January 1934.

copy boy, Harrison learned a lot of things about journalism while at the Graphic, as well as about the great commercial poten­tialities of scandal. In Early 1942, in his two-room nat, aided by famed girl painter Earl Moran, Harrison gave Life to a brand new kind of magazine, totally devoted to pin-ups. Its 48 pages, chock-fulJ of black­and-white pholOs of girls wearing bikinis or lingerie (with Harrison himself appearing as a "figurant", when necessary), certainly justified the magazine's tiLle-Beauty Pa­rade- Glorifying the American Girl. Ame­rica had been at war for a few months, and - as it had happened w ith the early girlie magazines of the 19 10's - soldiers were (for a few years, at least) Beauty Parade's most faith ful readers. To avoid troubles with censorship, Harrison thought well not to usc photos on the covers, thus continuing the painted cover tradi tion. As his main cover artisl, he managed to hire Peter Dri­bcn, who had previously embellished such sexy pulps as Gay Parisienne, 1/iglz Heel Magazine, Movie Stories, Silk Stocking Sto­ries and Spicy Stories. Putting aside the sty lized approach he had inherited from Enoch Bolles (which had, in the long run, looked a bit stereotyped), yet remaining basically true to thecanonsof"legart" as far as his girls' postures were concerned, Dri­ben pa.i nted a whole collection of wonderful female portraits, and as Harrison added new titles to his line of magazines- with Tiller (1944), Eyeful {1944), Wink {1945), Whi­sper (I 94 7) and Flirt (1948). aU of them published bi-monthly - Driben painted covers for them too, occasionally replaced by Moran (who signed himself with his middle name Steffa a<; he was working un­der exclusive contract for Brown & Bige-

Cover by Margaret Brundage, Sept. 1935.

low) or by Billy DeVorss (who also painted many girlie calendars and posters for Brown & Bigelow during Lhc 1940's). E vcn Lhough Harrison could count (from 1951 onwards) on an exceptional model named Beuy Page, his girlie magazines were not able to face Lhe competition of Hugh Hefner's Playboy, and had to fold by Lhe Mid-1950's. Harrison, however, had an ace up his sleeve: in De­cember. 1952, he had started publishing yet anolhertitle,ascandal magazinecalled Con­fidential- Uncensored and Off the Record {later, Lhe subtitle was changed to Tells the Facts and Names the Names). Delving as it did into Lhe darker side of Eisenhower's America, Confidential started out wilh a printrun of250.000 copies. selling over four million at its peak. Harrison himself became a very popular (if "dangerous") character: "The King of Leer" (a<> he was nicknamed) drove around the Big Apple in a white Cadillac. ever-present at all Lhe in-spots, and often appearing on TV talk shows. This lasted until Lhe late 1950's, when a chorus of remonstrations against Confidential's nasty gossip (Hollywood actors being its favouri­te victims) urged Harrison to make amends and to radically change Lhe magazine's contents, and later to abandon Lhe publis­hing field for keeps.

C e fut vers 1877 qu'en France, com­mencercnt 1'1 paraitre rcgulicrement des illus trations en couleurdebelles

jeunes filles en deshabille sur les couvertu­rcs de revues telles que La Vie Parisienne. Rapha~l J(jrchncr a cte le principal auteur de ccs images qui, bien qu'assez innocentes, etaient tout de meme excitantes. surtout pour le publicdeceneepoque-la Sonexem­ple fut sui vi par beaucoup d'autrcs artistes

Too Mueh

Temptation By

Gerard Ravel

Unsigned cover, probably by Enoch Bolles, from Gay Parisienne, January 1937.

tres Lalen tueux. parmi lesquel s C. Herouard, George Barbier, Pierre Brissaud et l'italien Umberto Brunelleschi (ne a Montcmurlo, en Toscane, en 1879). C'est ainsi que naqui­rent Le Journal Amusant, Gai-Paris, ou Le Sour ire qui imitaient ouvertement le mode­le de La Vie Parisienne. Raphael Kirchner devint veritablement le prophete de l'art pin-up qui venait de naitre et sa celebrite franchitl'oc&ln: en 1916, I' impresario Lhca­tral Florenz Ziegfeld lui demanda de cteco­rer avccses illustrations inimitables lefoyer des celebres Follies de Broadway. Aux Etats-Unis, les premiers exemples de revues qui reprenaient Ia formule de La Vie Parisienne, sans toutefois egaler sa finesse, apparurent lors de Ia Premiere Guerre Mondiale. Au toul debut, leur objectif etail

de remonter le moral aux soldaL'> du front et elles proposaienl une scrie de panels humo­ristiques accompagnes de gags allusifs. Captain Billy's Whiz Bang (fondc par Wil­liam H. Fawcell, l'un des noms lcs plus im­portanLS du monde de l'Cdilion aux Etats­Unis). Jim Jam Jem el le Calgary Eye­Opener furem quelques-uns des titres de magazines les plus celebres. Mais l'esprit des revues fran~aises, de mcmc que I' atmos­phere libertine du Paris des "annees 20", furem importes fidclcmcnt par des revues aux Litrcs "gaulois" Leis que Parisian Life, Gay Parisienne, La Paree Stories, Paris Nights, Gay French Life, French Night Life el French Scandals. Ccs revues et d'autres magazines comme Snappy, Spicy Stories, Bedtime Stories, Pep, Gayety ou Breezy

PI - UP ART 15

Three covers by Earle K. Bergey from Gay Broadway (Summer 1935, Fall1937) and La Paree Stories (May 1934) pulp magazines.

Stories - particulierement repandus, du­rant Ia periode aUant des annees 20 aux annees 30, grace a des editeurs comme Frank Munsey et William M. Clayton -sont collectivement identifies commc des sexy pulps ou des girlie pulps. La ou les pulps traditionnels vehiculaient une liltera­ture populaire d'aventures (du western au polar, de l'cxotisme a Ia science-fiction), les sexy pulps proposaient des recits d'inspira­tion romantique et erotique, avec des illu­strations en noir et blanc, realisecs habituel­lement dans un style cartoonyqui s'inspirait de celui du celebre John Held, jr. Ce demier avait d'ailleurs ete l'un des premiers colla­borateurs de Snappy. Quelques revues, tel­les que Stolen Sweets ou Tattle Tales, con-

llltC1!~1-IIR

tenaient aussi des photos de nus feminins. Dans le contexte de l'art pin-up, Jes sexy pulps acquirent une importance considera­ble: les illustrations multicolores des cou­vertures, realisees a Ia gouache, etaient excellentes. Sur ces couvertures, il n'y avail qu'unseul sujet feminin (generalement peint sur fond blanc pour mieux le fa ire ressortir) dont les poses, savarnment etudiees, souli­gnaientle gal be de leur corps. On mettai ties jambes en relief, si bien que ce genre d'illu­stration est encore connu de nos jours sous le nom de leg art; on montrait celles-ci tanti'>t nues, tanti'>t moulees dans ces bas nylon qui representaient pour le lecteur de cett.e epoque-la un tres fort appel sexuel. II y avait, du reste, dans lcs noms memes des

revues telles que Silk Stocking Fun ou High Heel Magazine, de claires references fet.i­chistes. Pendant les annees de Ia Grande Depression, avec leurs couvertures invitan­tes et le urs his to ires osees, ces revues furent une bonne distraction pour l'americain moyen, afflige par ses problemes quoti­diens de survie. De leur c6te, les editeurs cherchaient a faire des prix a leurs lecteurs et leur offraient jusqu'a cinq revues d.iffe­rentes dans un abonnement trimestriel cumulatif pour 3, 75 dollars-cette somme correspondait a Ia paye moyenne de trois jours de travail. Des revues comme Film Fun, Movie Humor, Movie Merry-Go­Round et Saucy Movie Tales, ayant com me reference specifique le monde du cinema ct

Three covers by Enoch Bolles from Spicy Strories (December 1937, December 1936) and Gay Parisienne (February 1935) magazines.

16 EST H E T I Q u E

Nude covers by Charles Blaine from Saucy Movie Tales (Dec.1935, March 1935, Sept. 1936).

ses coulisses, se pla~aient dans Ia meme lign~ que les revues cities ci-dessus. Le principal i Uustrateur de couvertures de sexy pulps, pendantles anntes 20 et30, fut Enoch Bolles. Ce demier sut cr~r-dans un style Ami-chemin entre le realisme etla caricatu­re- un modele de femme provocante ca­racterise par une bouche genereuse- pre­sque toujours entrouvcrte dans un sourire aiJusif et soulignee par un rouge a levrcs intense - et par des yeux A demi-fermcs, recouverts d'un maquillage trcs accentue. Dans les illustrations de Bolles, Ia presence d'objets plus ou moins explicitement phalli­ques (des selles, des arrosoirs, des ancres, des epres etc .. ) accentuait Ia dose d'croti­sme, suggerant meme que Ia pin-up etait en

train de mimer un rapport sexuel. George Quintana, Ray A. Burley, Earle K. Bergey etPeterDriben furentdedignes "emules" de Bolles. Nous aurons, par Ia suite, !'occasion de parter de certains d'entre eux. La presence feminine futtoujours constante sur les couvertures des pulps d'aventures, et dans certains cas on peut justement parler de pin-up art. n suffit de regarder, par excm­ple, les illustrations audacieuses et inquie­tantes de Margaret Brundage pour Weird Ta/es(l932-45), 1esjeunes filles de l'espace aux courbes genereuses dessinees par Earle Bergey pour des revues de science-fiction telles que Startling Stories (c.l939-50) et Captain Future ( 1941-45), o u que les dam­sels in distress devetues et victimes de

maniaques ou de savants fous dessintes par William Reusswig, John Newton Howitt. Charles Blaine, Rafael M . DeSoto et d'au­tres pour Dime Detective Magazine, Dime Mystery Magazine, Terror Tales, Horror Stories,Romantic Detective,Private Detec­tive Stories et d'autres revues semb1ables, publiees surtout par Ia Popular Publications et Ia Trojan Publishjng. Ce fut justement cette derruere maison d'Mition dont le siege etajt a Wilmington, dans le Delaware, qui Ian~. en avril 1934,les spicy pulps. Ces re­vues offraient des recits dans lesquels !'a­venture et le suspense accompagnaient Ia violence et l'erotisme. Le fondateur de Ia Trojan (connue aussi com me Culture Publi­cations) fut Harry Donenfeld (1898-1965),

"Phallic symbols": covers from R991 Humor (Dec. 1937, Feb. 1938) by G. Quintana, and from Film Fun (June 1931) by E. Bolles.

PIN UP ART 17

Peter Driben, April 1955 (Vol. 14 # 2).

ce meme Harry Donenfeld qui futle t.itulaire de Ia DC Comics de 193 7 a 1964, la maison d'edit.ion qui public encore de nos jours les comic books de Superman et de Batman. Jamais pourtantle nom de Doncnfeld n'ap­parut sur les publications de 1a Trojan/Cul­ture: il sc rescrva lc ro le plus "confortablc" de silent partner, e tlaissa que son associe Frank Armer figure com me Cditeurde Spicy Detective, Spicy Western Stories, Spicy My­stery et Spicy Adventure Stories. Les spicy pu/psconnurentl'apogeede leur glo irecntre les annecs 1934 et 1938, avant que lcs censcurs obligcm Doncnfeld et Armer a mitiger leur contcnu. Lcs his to ires erotico­aventurcuses, &:rites par des auteurs com­me Robert Leslie Bellem, Heruy Kuttner, Hugh Cave, et par ce meme Robert E. Howard qui avait crcc le barbare Conan,

• -·--.

" Ktw ...... MAOUINI -Billy DeVorss, Dec. 1947 (Vol. 1 # 1 ).

18 E ST H E T I Q C E

-l5<

B. Page on cover, Aug. 1953 (Vol. 10 # 1 ).

furem savamment synthetisees et peintes a Ia gouache sur les couverturcs ou !'on pre­sentait de belles jeunes fiUes, a demi-ve­tues, menacecs par des presences demonia­qucs ou par des criminels sadiques. Ces iUustrations,empreintesderealismc,ontete dessinecs par des artistes d'une indeniable valeur, commc Hugh J. Ward (respectable iUustrateur de revues "serieuses'' te lle que Liberty)et Harry Parkhurst qui anticiperent, par moments, le ftlon fetichiste-bondage en vogue a partir du demier apres-guerre. En janvier 1943, Armer et Doncnfcld, toujours plus harccles par Ia censure, decidcrent de transformer radicalemcnt leur pulps: ils changerent Ia parole Spicy avec Speed qui ctait plus neutre; puis ils tinirent par tout Iiquidcr en 1950. L'ere des spicy pulps etait revolue, mais hcureuscment, uneautre vcnait

Peter Driben, Sept. 1948 (Vol. 2 # 3).

Peter Driben, Oct. 1954 (Vol. 1 0 # 2).

de commencer: celle des girlies magazines de Robert Harrison. Au debut des annees 20, Robert Harrison commen~a une carriere de joumalistc, alors qu'il n'etait qu'adolescent. II travaillait dans un quolidien a scandales: New York Gra­phic. Meme s'il avait du se contenter d'un paste subalteme de gar~on de courses du­rant les annees passees au Graphic, il y apprit enormement sur le journal is me, sur­tout sur les innombrables capacites com­merciales de Ia Presse a scandales. Durant les premiers mois de l'annee 1942, dans son modeste deux-pieces, Harrison lit naltre­avec 1a collaboration de Earl Moran, grand "peintre de filles"- un nouveau genre de publication, entierementconsacreeaux pin­ups. Ses 48 pages, couvertes de reportages photo en noir et blanc avec de magnifiques

HOW CHORUS OIRLI ARI MADE ......

Billy DeVorss, July 1949 (Vol. 5 # 6).

Peter Driben, cover from TiNer, Vol. 9 # 5, April 1953. Peter Driben, cover from Eyeful, Vol. 2 # 6, March 1946.

poupees en maillms de bain "deux-pieces" ou en lingerie justifmient totalementle Litre meme de Ia revue: Beauty Parade-Glori­fying 1he American Girl. Harrison apparais­sait d'a.illeurs dans ces reportages comme "figurant". L'Amerique venait de rentrer en gucrredepuispeu,lessoldats(toutdu moins au debut) reprcsentcrent une bonne tranche des lecteurs de Beauty Parade, com me cela etail deja arrive pour les revues "osecs" des annees 10. Pour les couvertures, Harrison eutla bonne idee de ne pas utiliser de pho­tos; il prefera continuer Ia tradition des painled covers, pour eviter aussi d'even­tuels ennuis avec Ia censure. II s'assura les services de I' excellent Peter Dri ben qui avail, pendant Ia deuxieme moit.ie des annees 30, egaye avec ses gouaches les couvertures de revues com me: Gay Parisienne, lligh Heel Magazine, Movie Humor,SilkSwcking Sto­ries et Spicy Stories. Dribcn abandonna les illustrations stylisees d'Enoch Bolles qui, a Ia longue, apparurent un peu stereotypCcs, mais, tout en restant fidele aux canons de Ia leg ar1 pour Ia position de scs girls, il realisa toute unc seric de magnifiques portraits fcminins. Au fur eta mesure que Harrison ajoutait de nouveaux titres de revues a son camet-avec Titter (1944), Eyeful (1944), Wink( l945), Whisper(l941)etFlirt (1948), qui sorta.icnttous les deux mois, Driben en illustrait les couvcrturcs - aide, plus ou

moins rcgulicrement - par Moran (qui sigr~ait Steffa, puisqu'il ctait sous contrat avec Brown & Bigelow) et par le trcs talen­tue ux Billy De Vorss (auteur de nombreux calcndriers et affiches pour Brown & Bige­low, toujours dans les annecs 40). Bien que Harrison put compter, a partir de 1951, sur un modele d'except.ion comme Beuy Page,

Steffa (Earl Moran), March 1948 (Vol. 1 # 2).

ses girlie magazines furent ecrases par le Playboy aux brillantes couleurs, en papier couche d'Hugh Hefner, et its durem capiw­ler vers le milieu des annees 50. Mais, Harrison avail encore de nombreux atouts dans son jeu: en deccmbre 1952, il ir~augura une nouvelle revue a scandales, Confiden­tial. Ce magazine, qui representait, sous bien des aspects, Ia "mauvaise conscience" de I'Amerique d'Eiscnhower, debuta avec un t.irage de 250.000 exemplaires pour arri­ver a en vendre jusqu'a quatre millions par numero. Harrison devint un veritable per­sonnage, memes' it eta it plut.6t"derangeant". Sumomme "The King of Leer" (dontla tra­duction litterale est "le Roi du Regard en coulisse" mais dont I' assonance avec "King Lear", Je roi shakespearien, est evidente), l'editeur voyageait a bord d'une Juxueuse Cadillac blanche; il frequentaitles lieux de rencontre les plus chics et on l'invitait regu­lierementdans les talk shows televises. Cela dura au moins jusqu'a Ia fin des annees 50. Les protestations de ceux qui se sentaient leses par les "medisances" malveillantes de Confidential (tout d'abord, de nombreux acteurs d'Hollywood) obligerent Harrison, dans un premier moment, a se repentir pu­bliquement puis a changer radicalement Ia ligne directrice de sa revue et enfm a a ban­donner !'edition.

P I N UP ART 19

A1argaretBrundage Covers for «Weird Tales» pulp magazine

20 E S T H E T I Q U E

W ..... , ......... -:.::~

e1t .. u. ---ale.r ·

t

•<! WOLF GIRL • ) li IO ~ ~[lf N .,.

',, ' /'-...

·; .. , .. ,

' ~-,, • , . ·. • • • • •••• •~· t .(• • • 11•1•1 I ... Utt• • • t•• s tIt Ill

u-... Jeird "Talef

·/:_ . . ~ .. .;

·: --

·~ . . ' ~\ •.. . 1'

.... . . ·;": . ,

.. , - --.. - \ ... ' ..l • ... .

C p ART 21 PI:\

22 E S T H E T I Q t; E

Above: Covers from Weird Tales: September 1938, September 1933, March 1936, September 1937, January 1936, and November 1936. Opposite: Covers from Weird Tales: January 1934, June 1933, November 1934, and September 1934. Page 20: Cover from Weird Tales, November 1937. Page 21 : Covers from Weird Tales: August 1938, October 1933, November 1935, Nov. 1933, March 1938, January 1938, October 1932, June 1938, and October 1937. Margaret Brundage did 67 covers in all for Weird Tales, the well-known pulp magazine, from 1932 to 1945.

Weird Tales is copyright e Weird Tales, l td

PIN UP ART 23

Harry J. Parkhurst Hugh J. Ward

John Newton Howitt .. . Covers for

«Spicy Detective Stories», «Spicy Mystery Stories», «Horror Stories», «Terror Tales»,

and other pulp magazines

24 E S T H E T I Q C E

P I :\ li P A R T 25

26 E S T H E T I Q U E

Above. Torture and sadism on pulp magazine covers by: Charles Blaine, New Mystery Adventures, December 1935; Wilham Reusswig, Dime Detect1ve Magazine, September 1933; William F. Soare, Horror Stones, June/July 1937; Jerome Rozen, Private Detective Stories, June 1940; Harry J. Parkhurst, Spicy Mystery Stories, October 1937; Rafael M. DeSoto, Ten Detective Aces, June 1936. Opposite: Six covers by John Newton Howitt from Horror Stories (July 1935), Dime Detective Magazine (March 1934), Terror Tales (October 1935), Horror Stories (August/September 1937, September 1935), and Terror Tales (January 1935); and three covers by John Drew from Horror Stories (Feb./March 1937), Terror Tales (Nov./Dec. 1937), and Horror Stories (March 1940). Page 24: Harry J . Parkhurst, cover from Spicy Detective Stories, May 1935. Page 25: H.J. Ward, covers from Spicy Mystery Stories (August 1935, June 1935, and May 1936) and Spicy Detective Stories (Dec. 1934).

Dime Detective Magazine, Horror Stories, and Terror Tales are copyright e Argosy Commumcations Inc. Private Detective Stories is copyright e Trojan Publications Spicy Detective Stories, Spicy Mystery Stories. and Spicy Adventure Stories are copyright e Culture Publications

P I ~- C P A R T 27

Enoch Bolles Covers for «Film Fun» and other magazines

28 E S T H E T I Q U E

JANUARY

J \.lly

f)

F11N

e Good O!de xmas Sheer /

c;OEC IAl CJ\NOID

..:AMEQl\ FEl\'fUQES

"\HE TlE -t'\-\A 1' ~U tv DS /

P I N U P ART 29

TOOT'S SWIET

30 E S T li E T I Q C E

FOorr:o~ iHOUGHT/

..,,. , •• 1!1:16

GAY 0~ .ti n g o~ I a,. MACAI.INE

Above: Covers from Gay Book Magazine (July 1936, Spring 1934) and Breezy Stories (February 1937, April1937, and June 1936). Opposite: Covers from Film Fun: April 1939, March 1934, December 1935, June 1938, March 1933, June 1935, December 1937, February 1936, and February 1935. Page 28: Cover from Film Fun, December 1933. Page 29: Covers from Film Fun: November 1937, January 1937, October 1937, and July (year unknown).

P I K U P ART 31

Peter Driben Covers for «Beauty Parade»

and other Harrison girlie magazines

32 E S T H E T I Q C E

BEAUTY PARADE

BEAUTY PARADE

FARMER'S NAUGHTY DAUGHTER

JULY

25~

P I N U P AR T 33

34 E S T H E T I Q u E

BEAUTY PARADE '"f..ht World's loueliest Girls

BEAUTY PARADE

BEAUn PARAD

. MODELS • PI N-Ul'S

au. 254

GALS WEAR THE PANTS!

P I N U P AR T 35

EAUTY IUDE

Page 32: Cover from Beauty Parade. Vol. 13 # 5, November 1954.

7··?-~

., """'Cirto ......... ; ~- .. -., ....,.,_._ .; .._111111111 ... .; ......., __

Page 33: Covers from Beauty Parade: December 1955 (Vol. 14 # 6), August 1955 (Vol. 14 # 4; o riginally created for the July 1949 issue), March 1951 (Vol. 10 # 1), and July 1951 (Vol. 10 # 3). Page 34: Covers from Beauty Parade: August 1948 (Vol. 14 # 5), June 1949 (Vol. 8 # 2). January 1953 (Vol. 11 # 6), and November 1953 (Vol. 12 # 5; originally painted for the August 1949 issuA of Flirt). Page 35: Covers from Beauty Parade: December 1946 (Vol. 5 # 6), October 1947 (Vol. 6 # 4), March 1953 (Vol. 12 # 1), May 1947 (Vol. 6 # 2), August 194 7 (Vol. 6 # 3), Apri11948 (Vol. 7 # 1 ), December 194 7 (Vol. 6 # 5), August 1946 (Vol. 5 # 4). and June 1948 (Vol. 7 # 2).

36 E S T H E T I Q U E

H I H

25C

Above: Covers from Rirt February 1953 (Vol. 6 # 1), August 1951 (Vol. 4 # 4), April1953 (Vol. 6 # 2), August 1949 (Vol. 2 # 4), and February 1955 (Vol. 8 # 1). Opposite top: Covers from Beauty Parade: March 1952 (Vol. 11 # 1) and March 1955 (Vol. 14 # 1 ). Opposite bottom: Covers from Whisper. March 1949 (Vol. 2 # 6), November 1948 (Vol. 2 # 4 ), and May 1948 (Vol. 2 # 1 ).

P J N UP ART 37

Above: Pin-up girl by Gil Elvgren. © Brown & Bigelow Opposite: Mutoscope cards by Rolf Armstrong (top) and Earl Moran (bottom).© Brown & Bigelow

38 E S T H E T I Q U E

Brown & Bigelow, the Pin-up Factory

S ulla sponda sinistra del Mississippi. nella parte s ud-orientale del Minneso­ta, sorge St. Paul, capitale di quello

stato fin dal 1858. Nata net 1820 come insediamento di commercianti di pelli, e oggi (insieme con Ia "gemella" Minneapo­lis) un notevole centro indus triale ed un importante mercato granario, di bovini e suini. Ma per almeno mezzo secolo, SL Paul c stata anche (ed e questo che a noi piu interessa) il maggior centro di produzione della pin-up art "made in USA": risale infat­ti at 1903 Ia pubblicazione, da parte di Brown & Bigelow, di un girlie calendar abbellito da un dipinto di Angelo Asti inti­tolato Colette. Sta di fauo che Brown & Bigelow e il nome della primae piu impor­tante casa produttrice di calendari del moo­do, ehe ancor oggi ha Ia sua scde su Plato Boulevard, nella c itta del Minnesota. Quel primo calendario a soggetto femminile e il suo succcsso commerciale (ne furono ven­dute oltre un milione e mezzo di copie) aprirono Ia strada alia produzione in serie di girlie calendars e-di conseguenza - alia creazione di uno staff di artisti specializzati nella realizzazione di irnmagini sempre piu ammiccanti e sensuali. Pur continuando a realizzarc calendari di ogni generc. Brown & Bigelow pensarono bene di dedicare una considerevole "fetta" della loro produzione aile "donnine dipinte". trasformandosi per molti versi in una vera e propria "fabbrica delle pin-ups".

La superiorita di Brown & Bigelow nel senore dei pin-up calendars e de lla pin-up art in gencralc, fu dete rminata dalla loro abilita ne ll'assicurarsi quasi tutti i miglio ri artisti de l scllore, anche e soprauutto "ru­bandoli" alia concorrenza con alleua nti propostc finanzia rie. Durante gli anni '20 e '30, Rolf Armstrong ( 1889-1960) fu Ia ve ra

"punta di diamante" di Brown & Bigelow. Ex pugileeskipper di fama. Armstrong. che si era forma to artisticarnente a l Chicago Art Institute. c roo una scrie infinita di delicate immagini, quasi tutte rcali7.zatc con co Iori a pastcllo c basate su modelle piuuosto che su foto. Era, forsc, proprio quest'ultimo aspet­to a fare Ia diffe renza tra le pin-ups di Armstrong e quclle di altri artisti suoi con­tcmporanei, a rcndcrlc piu vivc e "calde", sia quando assumevano aueggiamcnti sofi­sticati esognanti, s iaallorchCsi mostravano birichine e giocose. Arm trong fu forse il primo a conciliare Ia pin-up art con l'arte "scria". c reando opere che avrebbcro fauo Ia loro bella figura sui Ia parcte di un negozio di barbiere come su quella di un musco. Fino ai primi anni '40, i princ ipali clienti di Brown & Bigelow (come pure di altri edito­ri specializzati nella produzionedi calenda­ri) furono le irnprcsccommcrciali e-limi­tatarncnte at periodo bcllico - i soldati. I calendari con pin-ups, che potevano avere un'unica illustrazione, oppure sci, o dodici (una per ogni mese de ll'anno) venivano starnpati lasciando. tra lapin- upe ledate de l calendario, lo spazio per Ia starnpigliatura del nome delle varie diue, che avrcbbcro poi curato la distribuzione de i ca.lendari ai pro­pri clienti e dipendenti, come "omaggio di fine anno" oppure a fini pubblic itari. I ca­lendari coo pin-ups avevano, di conseguen­za, una diffusione assai ampia, per c ui Ia nudita (pur se mediata dalla riproduzione

PI N U P ART 39

artistica) era general mente evit.at.a. Furono gli anni '20 e '30 a vcdere Ia maggior diffu­sione di figure nude sui pin-up calendars, anche sc l'ambientazione "esotico-onirica" contribuiva non poco a farprendere a quelle figurazioni le dovute dist.anzc dalla vita di tutti i giomi. Con l'avvento della Scconda Guerra Mondiale, le pin-ups di Brown & Bigelow tomarono, pcrcosi dire, alia rcallA: i raga1.zi aJ frome avevano bisogno di qual­cosa che ricordassc loro i lati piu piacevoli di quella quotidianita cui erano st.ati strap­pati, e le "girLf dipime" di Brown & Bige­low - con i loro modi un po' infantili e le I oro gam be lOmite, con i I oro aueggiamen­ti apparentemente sprovvcduti e le loro boc-

che camosc- facevano delloro meg I io per surrogare, in questa loro ambiguita di fon­do, ora Ia sorella, ora l'amica sinccra, ora Ia girl-friend, ora il non meglio identificato "oggeuo del desiderio" del private a stclle e striscc. Fu proprio durante il pcriodo bcllico chc Brown & Bigelow- soprauuuo in ragione della crcsccnte richicst.a di pin-ups da parte delle Fort-e Arrnate - diversificarono Ia propria produzione "riciclando" le immagi­ni dei calendari o crcandone di nuove per altri formati c altri media. Le "donnine dipintc" targate B&B apparvero su manife­s ti, scrie di mini-poster, canoline (denomi­nate mutoscope cards) ouenibili da distri-

Draw1ng by M11ton Candf from Male Ca//wart1me stnp, Apn14th, 1943. e M11ton Caniff

10 E S T H E T I Q u E

Zoe Mozert portraying movie star Jane Russell for The Outlawmovie poster (1946), reproduced above.

butori automatici al prezz.o di cinque cents ciascuna, e ancora su scatole di fiammiferi, portasigareuc e pcrsino bretclle (per uomo, natural mente). La popolarita delle pin-ups em talc, chc sulle fusolicre di molti acrci da combattimento artisti non profcssionisti presero a dipingere donn inc copiandole dai calendari di Brown & Bigelow, oppurc dai paginoni di Esquire [vcdi il sccondo volu­me], inaugurando cosl un scuorc "pcriferi­co" della pin-up art pas sa to aJ Ia storia con Ia denominazione nose art (dove con "nose" si intendeva, appunto, Ia fusolicra dell'aerco). Sc, poi, accadeva che un pill·llp artist di chiara fama venissc arruolato, lc Forzc Arrnatc amcricane non si lasciavano ccrto sfuggirc l'occasione di aggiungcre ai suoi doveri militari it compito d i rallegrare le truppc con le sue titillanti illustrazioni: e quanto accadde, per escmpio, ad Earl Mac­Pherson (n. 1911 ), che dopo aver rcalizzato per Brown & Bigelow due Artist's Sketch Pad Calendars ncl 1940 e 194 1, vennc re­clut.ato in Marina cd ebbc modo di dccorare con lesuepin-ups posti di guardia cd alloggi per gli ufficiali. Net 1941, Esquire aveva inaugurato Ia vcndita per posta c aJ deLLaglio di pin-up calendars, aprcndosi le pone dj un mcrcato fmo ad allora incsplorato, net qualc ben presto si gcttarono a capofitto anche Brown & Bigelow, che contrapposcro aile statuarie girls di Albeno Vargas le figurazioni piu "sbarazzine" rna non meno scnsuali create cfaj loro artist.i. Durante gli anni '40 e '50, 1a company di SL Paul poteva con tare su nomi di assoluto valore quali Earl Moran. Gil Elvgrcn, ~ Mozen, Ted Withers, K.O. Munson, Freeman Elliot. AI Buell, Jules Erbit, Fritz Willis e altri ancora. Ma furono

Nose art. Drawing by Milton Can iff from a Male Call strip (June 17th, 1945), and his heroine on the "nose• of a B-25.

soprattutiO i primi tre a "lasciare il segno" nella s10ria della pin-up art. Earl Steffa Moran era nato 1'8 dicembre 1893 a Plaine, neli'Iowa, e ancora adole­scentc si era dedicato all'illustrazionc se­gucndo Ia lezione di Charles Dana Gibson, James Montgomery Flagg e Coles Phillips. Dopo aver studiato presso il Chicago Art Institute c 1'Art Students League di New York, lavoro come aiuto-tipografo c poi come discgna10re di moda. Nel 1934 entro in forza allafactory di Brown & Bigelow, sostituendo progrcssivamente Rolf Arm­strong come !oro principale pin-up artist. Trc anni dopo Moran aveva un suo studio a Manhattan, dove l'artista creo i suoi piu bei dipinti a pastcllo ispirandosi con le sinuosi­ta di magnifiche modelle, tra le quali si di­stinscro anche lc giovani e non an cora famose Marilyn Monroe e Jayne Mansfield. Moran realizzo anche illustrazioni pubblicitarie per Scars, Roebuck & Co., copcrtine per riviste quali Life c Beauty Parade (di quest'ultima, come si e vista, era anche co-ediiOre) e poster cinematografici (come quello per Something/or the Boys, 1944). Dopo Ia fine del sodaliziocon Brown & Bigelow (1958), Moran dipinse nudi femminili per commit­tenti privati fino a circadueanni prima della sua morte, che avvenne il 17 gcnnaio 1984 a Santa Monica, in California. L'amore per Ia pittura e per i colori nacque mol10 pres10 nel grande Gillette A. Elvgren ( 1915-1980), forse anche perc he suo padre era proprietario di un grande negozio di vernici a SL Paul, nel Minnesota. Dopo aver studiaiO alia American Academy of Fine Arts, Elvgrcn si era occupato soprattutiO di illustrazione pubblicitaria lavorando a Chi­cago nella studio di Haddon Sundblom (famoso autore dei manifesti della Coca­Cola) insieme con altri artisti del calibro di AI Buell, Andrew Loomis e Harry Ekman, prima di dedicarsi alia pin-up art realiz­zando, fin dagli anni '30, calendari, poster e car10line per Ia Louis F. Dow Co. di SL

Joseph, Missouri,e poi (dal l945)perBrown & Bige low. Le sue bellissime girls erano dipinte in uno stile "morbido", talvolta fi­nanche "etereo", che certo risentiva della lezionedi Sundblom ed aveva aspetti comu­ni con quello usa to da Peter Driben perle co­pertine di Beauty Paradee delle altre riviste di Robert Harrison. Memorabili furono anche le pin-ups che Elvgren tratteggio per diverse campagne pubblicitarie della Coca­Cola. Tolte, forse, le sue primissime prove, Elvgren fu l'unico, tra i pin-up artists di Brown & Bigelow, a mantenere livelli di assoluta eccellenza in tutti i suoi dipinti, e soprattutiO a creare delle figurazioni che ancora oggi, a quasi cinquant'anni di distan­za, non appaiono affatiO datate. CondotiO ad una morte prematura dalla sua passione per

Gil Elvgren, 1954. e The Coca-Cola Co.

le bevande alcoliche, Elvgren e stato consi­dcraiO per anni una sorta di "Vargas dei poveri", rna oggi, per fortuna, si comincia a render giustizia al suo incredibile taleniO, e le sue opere hanna raggiunto quotazioni da capo giro. Fu nei primi anni '30 che Alice Adelaide Moser (nata il 4 luglio 1907 a Colorado Springs, nel Colorado) decise di cambiare il suo nome nel piu evocativo ~ MozerL Iniziata ai segreti dell'illustrazioneda Thorn­ton Oakley, allievo del grande N.C. Wyeth, Ia Mozert lavoro per qualche tempo come vetrinista a Philadephia prima di realizzare, intorno al 1933, i suoi primi pastelli a sog­getiO fcmminile. Fino al 1940, le sue illu­strazioni ornarono le copertine di riviste quali Romantic Movie Stories, True Confes­sions e Screen Book, nonche di sexy pulps quali Paris Nights, e nel 1938 !'American Weeklydi William Randolph Hearstpubbli­co dodici suoi dipinti. La Mozert realizzo pure moltissime illustrazioni pubblicitarie per committenti quali Irresistible Perfume, Dr. Pepper e Kool Cigarettes. Intomo aJ 1941 , ~ invio alcuni suoi dipinti di nudi femminili a David Smart, ediiOre di Esqui­re, che se ne most.rO entusiasta e ne compro una dozzina, anche se per qualche motivo non li pubblico mai. Subito dopo, Orion Winford, dircttore artistico per Brown & Bigelow, offri alia Mozert un contralto in esclusiva a condizioni molto favorcvoli, e l'artista accettO di buon grado. II suo primo "nudo di donna" per B&B, Sweet Dreams, fu il piu vendutodallacompagniadi SL Paul nel 1943. Le delicate pin-ups a poi[ della Mozertcontinuarono ad apparire peri tipi di Brown & Bigelow fino alia meta degli anni '60 (quando per ognuna di esse ricevcva tra i 4000 e i 5000 dollari), rna l'artista ebbe modo di distinguersi anche in altri settori dcll'illustrazione: memorabile fu soprattut­to il manifesto da lei realizzato per il film The Outlaw (II mio corpo ti scaldera, 1943), raffigurante Ia "bomba sexy" Jane Russell.

PIN UP ART 41

Andrew Loomis. Underwater Fantasy. Plate from Figure Drawing for A/lit's Worth Walter T. Foster art book.

42 E S T H E T I Q C E

Nonostante pane delle sue opere riscnta di una certa lcziosita chc ccrtamcntc ne atte­nua (almena per quanto riguarda il pubblico maschile) l'impauo "epidenn ico", occorre riconoscere che Ia Mozert, scomparsa ne l 1993, fu una delle poche artiste del gentil sesso (le altre f urono Joyce Balla ntyne, Ruth Deckard e Pearl Frush) a sopravvivere age­volmente - fone di una preparazione tcc­nica di tutto rispetto e di una notevolissima sensibilit.a espressiva- in un settoreartisti­co pensato per i maseru e (almeno numeri­camente) dominato dai maschi. Lo "stile B&B" ebbc - come si accennava prima-diversi seguaci ed imitatori, inpar­ticolare nel settorc dei calendari. II maggio­re concorrentc di Brown & Bigelow fu La Shaw-Barton Company d i Coshocton, nel­l'Ohio (peraltro fondata da loro ex dirigen­ti), che nel 194 I pubblico un celebre calen­dario a immagine unica intitolato Going Places, il cui autore era quel MacPherson che Brown & Bigelow avevano avuto souo contralto per tre anni. All 'inizio del 1946, congedatosi dalla Marina degli Stati Uniti, MacPherson riprese a dipingerc calendari nel suo idiosincratico stile da "quademo degli schizzi" (che venne imitato in partico-1are dal suo ex assistente T.N. Thompson), e fu proprio Ia Shaw-Barton a pubblicarli, fino al 1957. Occorre anche ricordare che MacPherson c l'autorc dell'unico libro "didau.ico" mai uscito sulla pin-up art , pubblicato nel I 954 da Walter T. Foster nella sua celebre collana ed intitolato Pin­up Art: How to Draw and Paint Beautiful Girls. Un'altra cditrice, Ia Kemper-Thomas Company di Cincinnati, pure neii'Ohio, produssc moltissimi pin-up calendars tra

Nude painting by Earl Moran.

Pin-up artist Earl Moran in his studio.

gli anni '40 e i prim i anni '60, affidandoli ad artisti d i talento quali Arthur Sarnoff (n. 1912) e Bill Randall (n. 1911). Un altro editore, A. Fox, si specializzo- a cavallo tra gli anni '50 e '60- nella produzione di pin-up calendars le cui immagini metteva­no scm pre in panicolare evidenza le mutan· dine delle girls: tra i !oro au tori spiccavano Jay ScottPike{n. 1924), un artista spccializ­zato ne l ritrarre soggeui femminili anche peri comic books (dovesi occup(>, tra l'altro, di "tarzanicli" quali Lorna the Jungle Girl e

}ann of the Jungle), Art Frahm e il non meglio identificato Slattery. Nessunodei suddetti editori, tuttavia, arrivo mai a minacciare piu di tanto la supremazia di Brown & Bigelow. L'unico, vero, temibi­lissimorivalcdc llafactorydi SL Paul fu una bella rivista di grande fonnatochc per molti amanti della pin-up art rappresento(eancor oggi rapprescnta) un veroe proprio "scrigno deltesoro": stiarno parlando, natural mente, di Esquire .

P I .t\ U P A R T 43

Good girl art by RoH Armstrong, ca 1949. e> Brown & Bigelow

44 E S T H E T I Q C E

Gil Elvgren with Marlene Reilly, one of his models, in 1951. Roxanne, a pin-up girl by Gil Elvgren. © Brown & Bigelow

0 n the left bank of the Mississippi, in South-eastern Minnesota, the­re lies SLPaul, the capital city of

that state since 1858. Founded in 1820 by skin traders, St. Paul is today (together with its "twin," Minneapolis) a great industrial and agricultural centre. Yet, for at least half a century, St. Paul was also the main source of US pin-up art. In fact, the first US girlie calendar was issued in 1903 by Brown & Bigelow, embellished by a painting by Angelo Asti entitled Coleue. Brown & Bigelow is the name of the ft.rst and largest calendar company in the world, which is still going full steam ahead today, in its PlatO Boulevard plant in St. Paul. That ft.rs t girlie calendar, and its commercial success (over 1,500,000 copies were sold) inaugu­rated a massive production of calendars feawring sexy girl paintings, which of cour­se needed a specialized staff of artists. Though it continued to publish any kind of calendars, Brown & Bigelow decided to devote a considerable deal of its production to painted girls, thus becoming a veritable "pin-up factory". Brown & Bigelow's superiority in the pin­up calendar field (as well as in the pin-up art field as a whole) was largely a consequence of its abilily in hiring all the best artists, whom it offered alluring wages. During the

1920's and 1930's, Rolf Armstrong ( 1889-1960) was B&B's top artist. A fonnerboxer and champion yachstman who had studied at the Chicago Art Institute, Armstrong created a whole series of delicate images, most of which done in pastels after live models rather than photOs - which was probably why they were so lively and "hot", both when their attitude appeared sophisti­cated and dreamy, and when they looked playful and mischievous. Armstrong was perhaps the first artist who was able to conjugate pin-up art with fine art, creating works which would certainly cut a fine figure in a museum as well as they did on the wail of a barber's shop. Up until the Early 40's, the main clients of B&B (as well as of other calendar publis­hers) were commercial outfits and - du­ring wartime - soldiers. Pin-up calendars, which consisted of one, six, or twelve illu­strated pages, were primed leaving enough room between the picture and the calendar dates for the client company to print its own name and advertisement. Each company would then distribute the calendars tO its custOmers and employees, as a gift and/or a promotional piece. Consequently, pin-up calendar distribution was wide, and nudity (if toned down by the artistic medium) was generally avoided. Nude paintings were

rather customary in the 20's and 30's, yet their exotic/dreamlike settings contributed to keep them far from everyday reality (and from censorship). With theoutburstofWW2, the B&B pin-up calendars went back to reality. Soldiers needed something which could remind them the most pleasant aspects of the everyday life they had been taken away from, and the B&B girls, with their apparently naive attitude and their fleshy lips, did their best tO incarnate any kind of woman- the sister, the friend, the sweet­heart. as well as the unidentified "object of desire" of the American private. During wartime, due to the ever-growing request of pin-up paintings, Brown & Bige­low "recycled" calendar paintings, or crea­ted new ones, for other fonnats and media, such as posters, mini-poster series, post­cards (known as "mutoscope cards") obtai­nable from a machine at five cents each, match boxes, cigarette-cases , and even braces. Painted pin-ups were so popular, that many an aircraft fuselage was decora­ted with them (this peculiar branch of pin­up art being known as "nose art") by non­professional artists who copied them from the B&B calendars or from the Esquire gatefolds [see Book Two). If, then, a profes­sional pin-up artist happened tO be drafted, the Armed Forces didn't think twice and ad-

PIN UP ART 45

Two pin-ups by Arthur Sarnoff, 1946. © Kemper-Thomas Company

ded art chores to his military dulies: this is the case with Earl MacPherson (born 1911) who, after painting two Artist's Sketch Pad Calendars for B&B in 1940 and 1941, joi­ned the U .S. Navy and decorated the Ward Room with huge pin-up painlings. ln 1941, Esquire magazine started selling its pin-up calendars by mail and through retailers . Thus a new, hitherto unexplored market was fo und for pin-up art, and Brown & Bigelow naturalJy plunged into it, coun­tering Alberto Vargas's "statuesque" g irls with its more easy-going, yet equally sen­suous pictures. These were created, through the 40's and 50's, by a number of highly­talented anists which included Earl Moran, GilElvgren,Zoe Mozen, Ted Withers, K.O. Munson, AJ Buell, Freeman Elliot, Jules Erbit, Fritz Willis, and many others. Yet it was mainly the first three of them who made the history of pin-up an. Earl Steffa Moran was born on December 8, 1893 in Plaine, Iowa. SliiJ in his teens, he fell in love with illus tration, carefully stu­dying the works of such greats as Charles Dana Gibson, James Montgomery Flagg, and Coles Phillips. After studying a t the Chicago Art Institute and the An Students League in New York, Moran worked as an apprentice printer, and later as a fashion designer. In 1934, he joined the Brown &

46 E S T I I E T I Q L E

Bigelow "factory" ,eventually replacing Rolf Armstrong as its top pin-up artist. Three years later Moran was working out of his own studio in Manhattan, where he created his finest pastel paintings, drawing inspira­tion from the curves of many a gorgeous model, including young Marilyn Monroe and Jayne Mansfield. After leaving Brown & Bigelow in 1958, Moran continued pain­Ling female nudes as private commissions unlil abouttwo yearsbefore hisdeath, which took place in Santa Monica, California, on January 17, 1984. The great Gillctle A. Elvgren (1915-1980) became fond of painting and colours at an early age, perhaps because his father owned a large paint store in St. Paul, Minnesota. After studying at the American Academy of Fine Art, Elvgrcn became a full-ncdged illustrator when he joined the Haddon Sund­blom studioinChicago.ForSundblom (who is universally known for his Coca-Cola po­ster art), E lvgrcn did mainly advertising illustrations, working together with other great artists such as AI Buell , Andrew Loomis, and Harry Ekman. From the 1930's onwards, he devoted himself mainly to pin­up art, painting calendars, posters and post­cards for the Louis F. Dow Company of St. Joseph, Missouri, and later (from 1945 onwards) for Brown & Bigelow. His beau-

tiful girl oil paintings were done in a soft. almost "ethereal" style, which was certainly influenced by Sundblom's and had somet­hing in common with Peter Driben's cover paintings for Robert Harrison's magazines. Elvgren also did memorable pin-ups for several Coca-Cola advertising campaigns. Apart from his early renderings, Elvgren was the only pin-up artist who worked at top levels during his thirty-odd-year tenure with B& B, as well as one of the few who created picllU'es which are not at all affected by the passing of time. Led to an untimely death by his excessive fondness for alcoholic drinks, E lvgren has long been considered a son of "second-choice Vargas", yet today - at long last - his incredible talent has been recognized and prices fo r his original pain­tings have gone over the top. It was in the mid-1930's that Alice Adelaide Moser (born July 4 , 1907 in Colorado Springs, Colorado) decided to change her name into the more exotic Zoe Mozen. After learning the basics of illustration and painting from Thornton Oaldey (himself a discipleofN. C. Wyeth), Mozert worked for a while as a shop-window decorator in Philadelphia before doing herftrstfew pastel paintings portraying beautiful girls (circa 1933). Until 1940, her illustrations graced the covers of such magazines as Romantic

Pin-up by Joyce Ballantyne. Gag: "'can never get things straight.•

P l N I I P A R T 4 7

Two pin-ups by Fritz Willis: plate from the 1962 Artist's Sketchbook Calendar, and Lola (1966). e Brown & Bigelow

Movie Stories, True Confessions, and Screen Book, as well as those of sexy pulps like Paris Nights. In 1938, William Randolph Hearst's American Weekly published twel­ve of her paintings. Mozert also did several advertising illustrations for Irresistible Per­fume, Dr. Pepper, Kool Cigarettes, and other companies. In 1941 , Zoe sent some of her nude paintings to Esquire's publisher David Smart, who looked enthused and bought a dozen of them. For some reason, though, he never published any of them. Shortly after, Orion Winford, an art director at Brown & Bigelow, offered an exclus ive contract to Mozen, who d idn't think twice and joined the ~pin-up factory" staff. Her ftrSt female nude for B&B, Sweet Dreams, was the company's top seller for 1943. Mozen's delicate pin-ups continued to appear under the B&B imprint until the mid- 1960's(when the artist was being paid between $ 4,000 and S 5,000 for each of them), yet she was able to made a name for herself in other fields of illustration, too: the movie poster she did for 1943's The Outlaw, portraying sexy bomb Jane Russell. is a case in point. Though sometimes Mozert's pin-up pain­tings look a bit too affected, and lack the "neshy" quality which more attracts the male public, no one can deny that she was (Mozert died in 1993) the only female pin-

48 E S T H E T I Q U E

up artist (others worth remembering were Joyce Ballantyne, Ruth Deckard, and Pearl Frush) who managed to make it big - on account of her talent and excellent taste­in a field which was dominated by males. The "B&B style" had - as we said before -several followers and imitators, particu­larly as regards the calendar field . Brown & Bigelow's major competitor was the Shaw­Barton Company of Coshocton, Ohio (foun­ded by former B&B executives), which produced (1941) a famous one-sheet calen­dar entitled Going Places. Its author was Earl MacPherson, who had been a B&B for three years. Early in 1946, after serving in the U.S. Navy, MacPherson started painting pin-up calendars again in his idiosyncratic "sketchbook" style (later imitated by his former assistant, T .N. Thompson), which were published by Shaw-Barton untill957. It must also be remembered that MacPher­son authored the only ex isting "didactic" book on pin-up art, published by Walter T. Foster in his famous art book series, entitled Pin-up Art: How to Draw and Paint Beau­tiful Girls (1954). Another company, Kcmper-Thomas of Cinc innati, Ohio, produced several pin-up calendars between the 1940's and 1960's, entrusting them to such talented artists as Arthur Sarnoff (b. 19 12) and Bill Randall

(b. 1911). Another publisher, A. Fox, spe­cialized in pin-up calendars whose pictures almost inevitably focused on girls' panties. They were painted, between the 1950's and 1960's, by such artists as S lauery and Jay ScottPike (bom 1924), who also drew seve­ral girl characters (including jungle girls Lorna and Jann) for the comic books. None of the above-mentioned companies ever went so far as to seriously threaten B&B's supremacy. Competition came from another field, magazine publishing, when a beautiful, large-sized monthly started ap­pearing in 1933, eventually becoming a veritable treasure chest for pin-up art col­lectors. Tha t magazine was Esquire.

S t. Paul, capitalc du Minnesota de­puis 1858, a etc batie sur Ia rive gauche du Mississippi, dans Ia par­

tie sud-orientale de cct ctaL Nee en 1820, commebasepour lescommcrcantsen pcaux, e lle est aujourd'hui, avec sa "jumelle" Min­neapolis, un centre commercial rcmarqua­ble et unimportant marchc de blc, de bovins e t de porcins. Mais, cc qui nous imcresse le plus de celte ville, c'est que St. Paul a Ct£ aussi le plus grand centre de production de l'art pin-up madein USA.C'esten 1903qu'a etC public, par B&B, un girlie calendaromc

d'une pcinture de Angelo Asti intitulec Co­leue. D'aillcurs, Brown & Bigelow est cer­laincmcntle nom de La premiere maison d'e­dition Ia plus imponante de calendriers du monde. Son siege social sc trouve, encore aujourd'hui, Plato Boulevard, dans Ia ville de St. Paul. Ce premier calendrier, centre sur Ia femme, ainsi que son succes commer­cial, puisqu'on en vend it plus d'un million et demi d'exemplaires, favoriserentla produc­tion en strie de girlie calendars e t par con­stqucnt Ia creation d'une equipc d'artistes specialists dans Ia realisalion d'illustrations toujours plus scnsuelles et allusives. B&B, tout en conlinuanl a realiser des calendriers de toute sortc, jugerent opponun de dedier une "tranche" considerable a leur produc­tion de "jolies poupees pcimes". Sous bien des aspects, ils se transformcrem en une veritable "usine des pin-ups". La superiorite de Brown & Bigelow dans le secteur des pin-up calendars et de I' art pin­upen general, fut determinec par leur habi­lcte a s'assurer Ia collaboralion de presque tous les meille urs artistes dans cette bran­che. lis allcrcnt meme jusqu'a lcs "voter" a Ia concurrence avec des proposi Lions finan­cicrcs trcs avantageuscs. Pendantles annecs 20 et 30, Rolf Armstrong (1889-1960), fut certainement leur element le plus presti­gieux. Ce demier, ex-boxeur et skipper repute, qui avait r~u sa formalion artis liquc au Chicago An Institute, crea toute une serie d"illustrations dclicates, presque toutes rea­lisees avec des couleurs pastel s'inspirantde modeles plut6t que de photos. Peut-etre s'agissait-il Ia de !'aspect qui differenciait les pin- ups d'Armstrong de celles des autres anistes qui etaicnt ses contemporains. Ce la les rcndait plus vivantes et plus "chaudes", aussi bien quand elles prcnaient des poses sophistiquees et reveuscs qucquand elles se montraiemcoquines etludiques. Armstrong futpcut-etrcle premier qui concilia l'artpin­up avec !'art "serieux" car il composa des reuvres qui pouvaient faire unc bonne im­pression aussi bien sur le m ur d'un salon de barbier que sur celui d'un musee.

Jusqu'au debut des annees 40, les entrepri­sescommercialesainsiquelessoldats,durant uniquement Ia pCdiode de Ia guerre, furent lcs principaux clients de Brown & Bigelow (tout com me ceux d'autres &liteurs sp&:ia­lises dans Ia production de calendriers). On imprimait lcs calendriers avec pin-ups, pouvant contenir une seule illustration, ou bien six, voire douze (une pourchaque mois de l'annee). avec un espace blanc entre Ia pin-up et lcs dates, pour pcrmettre d'appli­quer le Limbre des differcntcs entreprises qui veillaient par Ia suite a distribuer ces calendriers a leurs clients ou employes commc "cadcau de fin d'annee" ou pour fairc de La publicite. C'estdonc pourquoi les calendriers avec pin-ups etaient abondam­ment diffuses et que Ia nudite (bien que mitigee par Ia reproduction artistique) eta it gcncralementevitee. Ce futdurantlesannees 20 etles annees 30 que les illustrations de nus sur les pin-up calendars connurentleur plus grande diffusion, mcme si le fait d'a­voir place ces nus dans un contexte "exoti­co-onirique" contribuaitlargement a mettre des dis tances entre ces illustrations etla vie de to us lcs jours. A vee Ia Deux ieme Guerre Mondialc, ces pin-ups furent, pour ainsi dire, repartees a Ia rCalite: les jeunes du front avaient besoin de quelque chose qui leur rappelle les aspects lcs plus agreables dece quotidien d'ou on les avaitarraches,et, les reproductions des girls de B&B avec leur auitudc un peu puerile, leurs jambes bien roulecs, leur componement apparem­ment na:if et leur bouche pulpeuse, faisaient de leur mieux pour remplacer, dans cctte ambiguitC de fond, tant6t Ia sreur, tant6t l'amie sincere, tant6t Ia girl-friend, tant6t "eel objet du desir" du private americain. Ce fut justement pendant Ia periode de Ia guerrcque Brown & Bigelow diversificrent

' --.... -~ -.-,-,.-,.__-___ _

leur production, surtout parce que les For­ces Armees reclamaient plus de pin-ups. lis "recyc lcrent" les iII ustrations des calendriers et en crccrent de nouvelles pour d'autres formalS Cl d'autres medias. Les "jolics pou­pees" griffl~es B&B apparurent sur des affi­ches, des series de mini-poster, des cartes­postales (appelees mutoscope cards) que I' on pouvait se procurer griice a des distribu­teurs automatiques a cinq cents l'une, ou encore sur des boites d'allumenes, des por­t.e-cigarenes et meme des bretelles (pour hommes, bien entendu). Ces pin-ups eurent un tel succes que des anistes non profes­sionnels peignirent sur le fuselage d'avions decombatles "jolies poupees" qu'ilsavaiem copiecs des calendriers de Brown & Bige­low, ou bien des pages centrales de Esquire [voir le deuxicme tome]. C'cst ainsi qu'ils inaugurerent un secteur "peripherique" de !'art pin-up qui devint celebre avec le nom de nose art, car nose designait justementle f usclagede l'avion. S'il ani vail ensuitequ'un artiste renomme dans !'art pin-up so it enr6-le, les Forces Arrnees americaines ne lais­saient pas echapper !'occasion d'ajouter au devoir militaire decedemier, celui d'egayer les troupes avec ses illustrations chatouil­lantes. C'est cc qui se produisit avec Earl MacPherson (ne en 1911), qui, apres avoir realise pour Brown & Bigelow deux Artist's Sketch Pad Calendars en 1940 et 1941 , fut recrute en Marine et put ainsi decorer avec

Hawaiian girl by Earl Mac Pherson from Pin-up Art: How to Draw and Paint Beautiful Girls (1954), a Walter T. Foster art book.

P I 1'\ U P A R T 49

Fetish srtuations in two pin-up artworks by Gil Elvgren. © Brown & Bigelow

ses pin-ups les postes de garde e t les loge­ments pour les officiers. En 1941, Esquire inaugura Ia veme au detail de pin-up calendars par correspondance, il ouvritlesportesa un marchequijusqu'aJors eLait inexplore. Brown & Bigelow s'y jete­rent Ia te te la premiere, ils opposerent aux girls sculpturales d'Aiberto Vargas les illu­strations plus "coquines" mais tout aussi sensuelles crcecs par leurs artistes. Pendant les annees 40 et 50, Ia company de St. Paul pouvait compter sur des noms de tres grande vaJeur comme Earl Moran, Gil Elvgren, Zoe Mozert, Ted Withers, K.O. Munson, Freeman Elliot, AI Buell, Jules Erbit, Fritz Willis ct bien d'autres encore. Mais ce fu­rent surtout les trois premiers qui "marque­rent" l'histoire de l'art pin-up. Earl Steff a Moran, ne le 8 decem bre 1893 a Plaine dans !'Iowa, sc consacra a !'illustra­tion, aJors qu'il n'l~t.ait qu'un adolescent, il suivit les l~ons de Charles Gibson, James Montgomery Flagg ct Coles Philips. A pres scsetudes au Chicago An lnstilutcet a I'Art Students League de New York, il travailla comme aide-typographe, puis comme dcs­sinateur de mode. En 1934, il pcrcra a Ia factory de Brown & Bigelow, e til remplacra progressivement Rolf Armstrong en qualite de principal pin-up artist. Trois ans plus tard, Moran ouvrit un studio a Manhattan. Ce futla qu'il crea scs plus belles pcintures pastel, s'inspirant des courbcs somptueuses

50 E S T II E T I Q C E

de magniliques modeles, parmi lesquclles on pcut c iter Marilyn Monroe et Jayne Mansfield qui et.aient tres jeuncs e t encore inconnues a CCllC epoque-la. Moran realisa aussi des illustrations publicitaires pour Sears, Roebuck & Co, des couvertures de magazines com me Life ctBeauty Parade (il etait aussi co-ed.iteur de ceue dcmiere re· vue, comme on l'a deja signaJe) et des affi­ches de c inema (com me celle pour Somet­hingfor the Boys, 1944 ). Lorsque se term ina sa collaboration avec Brown & Bigelow ( 1958), Moran peignit des nus fcmin ins pour des commissionnaires privcs jusqu'a deux ans avant sa mort. n s'eteignit le 17 janvier 1984 a Santa Monica, en Califomie. Ce fut tres tot que !'amour pour !'art et lcs couleurs naquit chez le grand Gillette A. Elvgren ( 1915-1980), probablement parce que son pere etail proprietaire d'un grand magasin de peintures a St. Paul dans le Minnesota. Apres ses etudes a !'American Academy of Fine Arts, Elvgren s'est surtout consacre a !'illustration publicitaire. 11 a travaille a Chicago chez Haddon Sundblom (le celebre auteur des aflichcs de Coca­Cola) avec d'autresartistes de la trempc d'Al Buell, Andrew L oomis et Harry Ekman, avant de se dedjer a I' art pin-up. A partir des annees 30, il a realise des calendrie rs, des affiches et des cartes-posrales pour la Louis F. Dow Co. de St. Joseph, au Missouri, el (a partir de 1945) pour Brown & Bige low. Le

style de ses trcs belles girls et.ait "souple", parfoisethcre; il subissaitprobablement l'in­nuence de Sundblom et il possedait des elements communs avec celui de Peter Driben pour ses couvertures deBeaucy Pa­rade et des autres revues de Robert Harri­son. Les pin-ups que Elvgren dessina pour plusieurs campagnes publicitaires de Coca­Cola furent aussi memorables. A pan ses tout premiers essais, Elvgren futle seul des pin-ups artists de Brown & Bigelow qui continua a conserver dans ses dessins un t.rCs hauL niveau de perfection. Mais il ful surtout celui qui crea des illustrations "inda­tables" encore aujourd'hui aJors que cin­quante ans se som deja ecoules. Mort pre­maturement a cause de son gout excessif pour l'aJcool, on a longtemps considere El vgren une sorte de "Vargas des pauvres", mais hcureuscmcnl aujourd'hui, on com­mence a rendre justice a son incroyable talent; d'ailleurs ses a:uvres ont aueint des prix faramineux. Alice Adelaide Moser (nee le4 juilletl907 a Colorado Springs) decida de changer de nom, vcrs lc debut des annees 30, el choisit Zoe Mozertqui lui semblait plusevocateur. Elle fut init.iee aux secrets de l'iUustration par Thomson Oakley, eleve du grand N.C. Wyeth el travailla pendant uncertain temps comme etalagiste a Philadelphie avant de realiscr, vers 1933, scs premiers pastels fc­minins. Jusqu'en 1940, ses illustrations

Leg art in two pin-up artworks by Gil Elvgren. <Q Brown & Bigelow

egayerent les couvertures de revues telles que Romantic Movie Stories, True Confes­sions et Screen Book, mais aussi des sexy pulps comme Paris Nights. En 1938l'Ame­rican Weekly de William Randolph Hearst publia douze de ses dessins. Zoe Mozert reaiisa aussi de nombreuses illustrations pu­blicitaires pour des commissionnaires comme Irrestible Perfume, Dr. Pepper et Kool Cigarettes. Vers 1941, Zoe envoya quelques-uns de ses nus feminins a David Smart, editeur de Esquire; ce demier en fut enthousiaste et en acheta une douzaine, pourt.ant, pour une raison qui nous echappe, il ne les publia jamais. Peu apres, Orion Winford, directeur artistique pour Brown & Bigelow, offrit a Zoe Mozert un contrat d'exclusivite a des conditions tres avanta­geuses que l'artiste se fit un plaisir d'accep­ter. Son premier "nu feminin" pour B&B, Sweet Dreams, fut !'illustration Ia plus ven­due de Ia societe de St. Paul en 1943. On continua a publier les delicates pin-ups a poi! de~ Mozert pour le public de Brown & Bigelow jusqu'a Ia moitie des annees 60 (lorsque pour chacune d'entre elles, I' artiste touchai t de 4000 a 5000 dollars). Mais, cette artiste put aussi se distinguer dans d'autres branches de !'illustration: son affiche pour le film The Outlaw (Le Banni, 1943) avec Ia "bombe sexuelle" Jane Russell fut memora­ble. Bien que Ia plupart de ses reuvres soient empreintes d'une certaine mievrerie qui

attenue ainsi !'impact "epidermique" (tout du mains pour ce qui conceme le public masculin), il faut reconnaitre que Zoe Mozert, morte en 1993, fut une des rares artistes femmes (Joyce Ballantyne, Ruth Deckard et Pearl Frush en furent aussi du nombre) qui put survivre aisement dans une branche artistique faite pour les hommes et dominee (tout du mains numeriquement) par Ies hommes. Elle arriva a ce resultat grace a sa soli de preparation technique et a sa tres grande sensibilite artistique. Le "style B&B" eut, comme nous l'avons deja evoque, differents emules et imita­teurs, surtout dans le domaine des eaten­driers. La Shaw-Barton Company de Cos­hocton dans I' Ohio fut Ia plus grosse concur­rente de Brown & Bigelow; ceue societe fut d'ailleurs fondee par quelques ex-dirigeants de B&B. En 1941, cette demiere publia un celebre calendrier n'ayant qu'une illustra­tion dont Ie nom etait Going Places creee par ce meme MacPherson qui avail signe, auparavant, un contratavec Brown & Bige­low d'une duree de trois ans. Au debut de 1946, une fois termine son service dans Ia Marine des Etats-Unis, MacPherson recom­men~ a peindre des calendriers dans un style tout a fait personnel de "camet d'ebau­ches" qui fut d'ailleurs imite par son ex­assistant T.N. Thompson. Ce futjustement laShaw-Bartonqui lespubliajusqu'en 1957. Il faut aussi rappeler que MacPherson est

l'auteur du seul livre "didactique" sur l'art pin-up, pub lie en 1954 par Walter T. Foster dans sa celebre collection, avec Ie titre sui­vant: Pin-up Art: How to Draw and Paint Beautiful Girls. Une autre maison d'edition la Kemper-Thomas Company de Cincinna­ti, toujours dans l'Ohio, produisit de tres nombreux pin-up calendars dans Ia periode qui vades annees 40 au debut des annees 60. On confia leur realisation a des artistes de talentcommeArthurSamoff(neen 1912)et Bill Randall (ne en 1911). Un autre editeur, A. Fox, se specialisa, a cheval sur les annees 50 et60, dans Ia production de pin-up calen­dars dont les illustrations mettaient tou­jours en evidence les petites culottes des girls: parmi leurs auteurs, on remarque Ies noms suivants: Art Frahm, un artiste connu sous le nom de Slattery etJay Scott Pike (nt en 1924), celebre pour ses sujets feminins, presents aussi dans les comic books ou il dessina entreautresLorna the Jungle Girl et ]ann of the Jungle. Aucun des editeurs que nous avons men­tionnes ne parvint jamais a ebranler Ia su­prematie de Brown & Bigelow. Le seul et unique rival redoutable de Ia factory de St. Paul fut une belle revue de grand format qui representa et qui represente toujours pour les amoureux de l'art pin-up une veritable "coffre au tresor": et nous sommes, naturel­lement, en train de parter d'Esquire.

PIN UP ART 51

Earl Moran Girlie calendars and pin-up photos

52 E S T H E T I Q U E

P T N T J P A R T S~

Pages 52·55: Pin-ups from mutoscope cards and girlie calendars produced by Brown & Bigelow. © Brown & Bigelow

54 E S T H E T I Q U E

WHY-WB'RB

BARELY ACOUAJNTBD

PI U P ART 55

.\'o kisses, and a girl a111l her !toney arc soon par/rd.

In these pages: Norma Jean Dougherty (future movie star Marilyn Monroe) in some photos («!> Playboy) shot by Earl Moran (1946-48) ...

56 E S T H E T I Q U E

... and pin-ups painted by the artist from those shots. © Brown & Bigelow

P I N U P AR T 57

Time to Call. <!:> Brown & Bigelow.

58 E S T H E T I Q U E

Marilyn Monroe nude painting, Late 1940s.

P I ~ C P A H T 59

Gil Elvgren Girlie calendars and pin-up paintings

60 E S T H E T I Q U E

P I N UP ART 61

62 E S T I I E T I Q U E

PIN UP ART 63

"This skin / love to touch."

6ft EST II ET I QC E

Hey Honey ... it's a cinch!

PI UP AR T 65

66 EST II ET I QUE

PI U P AR T 67

68 ESTHETIQUE

Above: .. Nothing to sneeze at." <!:> Brown & Bigelow Pages 60-68: Pin-ups for Brown & Bigelow reproduced from original posters and girlie calendars. e Brown & Bigelow

PIN UP ART 69

Earl MacPherson Pictures from

«Artist's Sketch Pad Calendars», «Pin-up Art: How to Draw and Paint Beautiful Girls»,

and pin-up photos

70 E S T II E T I Q t.; E

THE PASTELS are a pplied with my finger tips, to give a flesh-l ike quality and ,,-a te r color is used with small brushes

for detail in the eyes and teeth. Note a lso the use o f p rops, such as hats, aprons, etc .. which are an important part

of the pose. The originals of these illust rations are 21"' x 28"' overall , which is large enough for all reproduction

purposes and also a convenient painting size.

P T T T P A P 'T 7 1

1->AINTINa -the 1i1N-U1'

I

,,

\ '\

\ 1 :

\ { I ~ '

THE ADO\'!:: illust rations arc from the l\ lacPhcrson Sketchbook. an annual advettising ralendar, produced by the

Shaw-Barton Co. of Coshocton. Ohio, with a distribution of over a million ropics. Thc~e i llustrations arc for your

study, particularly in the use o f color and al~o to aid in thf' training o f vour model~. The medium used is pastel

and water color.

Pages 70-73: Drawings and pages from Pin-up Art: How to Draw and Paint Beautiful Girls art book, Walter T. Foster, 1954.

72 ES THETJ QUE

I

I ·" ~<;·?··~.

tl.

~~ r;, . .,, . : .............

'~"""" ·-~N.\1,. ":::.: r~ ,."- "' . r.::M , ... i' ·'

P T N T T P A R T 7~

Top: Betty Morelius posing for a MacPherson pin-up girl painting (right) in the Early 1940s. Above: Lili in a photo shot by the artist, and a plate from the 1941 Artist's Sketch Pad Calendar(© Brown & Bigelow).

74 E S T H E T I Q u E

I$ f,y (fo.ll ... 'U rr. _.;_ ......... _ ... ...................... ""' ......... _ .. .,;,.M ,..,_,.,.,"L)~ f

• ·• ~Ate"~ ~ • , J: • .. ~ •

., I )J u~ u 1:. tt '.l l.f~11t;'fl_.., :' :~ :.J ~ ..... ~ .. :,, :s .. ~ .)..' \1

~-Au'1'.sl ~ .- C' "' <" T t ' .! J .. ' • 1 , p. ID II 1.: 1.1 14 ,, '" ,, u "'~ :J ..!.:~,~~~:7.:1 :, ,. .. ,,

Minta Hoia (above left), Earl MacPherson's favourite model, posed for the 1954 Artist's Sketchbook Calendar, titled Hunter's Guide (~ Shaw­Barton). All pictures on this and previous page are from the book Memoirs of Earl MacPherson. ~ Earl MacPherson

P T T 1 P A R 'r 7C\

Zoe Mozert Brown & Bigelow girlie calendars

and mutoscope cards

76 E S T H E T I Q U E

All pictures on this and following page are copyright CO Brown & Bigelow

PI N U P AR T 77

Introduction 5

Sexy Pulps & Girlie Magazines 8

A1argaretBrundage 20

Harry Parkhurst, Hugh J. Ward, John Newton Howitt ... 24

Enoch Bolles 28

Peter Driben 32

Brown & Bigelow: the Pin-up Factory 38

Ear/A1oran 52

Gil Elvgren 60

Earl A1acPherson 70

Zoe Mozert 76

Above: Earl Moran, pin-up girl from his 1949 Brown & Bigelow calendar. © Brown & Bigelow Opposite: Gil Elvgren, plate from his 1952 Brown & Bigelow calendar. © Brown & Bigelow Final page: AI Moore, plate from the 1950 Esquire Girl Calendar. © Esquire Associates

The Golden Age of PIN-UP ART Book One

Testi I Text: Alberto Becauini

Redazione I Editorial staff: Riccardo Morrocchi, Stefano Piselli

Ricerca fonti I Research: Alberto Becattini, Riccardo Morrocchi, Stefano Piselli

Grafica e impaginazione I Concept & design: Stefano Piselli

Traduzione inglese I English translation: Alberto Becauini Traduzione francese I French translation: Susanna Longo

Stampa I Printed by: C.E. Nerbini, Firenze

Copertina I Cover: Gil Elvgren © Brown & Bigelow Retrocopertina I Back cover: Peter Driben

II copyright delle immagini riprodotte a fini di studio e documentazione si intende dei singoli autori e/o editori o di chiunque altro ne detenga i diritti

This book contains photos and drawings included for the purpose of criticism and documentation

All pictures copyrighted by respective authors, publishers and/or other copyright holders

© Copyright dell' opera: Glittering Images edizioni d'essai, Firenze Tutti i diritti riservati. Tous droits reserves. All rights reserved

Printed in Italy Firenze, Dicembre 1994

To be continued in Book Two .. .

E 0 T li E T I QU E FETISH &BIZARRE

Per Adulti - For Adults Only - Pour Adultes

GLITTERING

I M A G E S edizioni d'essai