Original Art from the Grand Age of American Illustration
Publishers of depression-era pulp magazines, post war men’s adventure and girlie magazines, and lurid paperback titles all used risqué, action-packed illustrations to make their offerings jump off the newsstands in the highly competitive market for readers attention. Cover art pushed the boundaries of what was allowable in a heavily-censored era, coming up with increasingly deviant and outlandish portrayals of sex, violence, and perilous escapes from danger. Today, these works—which provide an intriguing peek into the shadow side of 20th century American culture—are studied by historians and coveted by collectors.
This underworld, barroom image shows a head-turning femme fatale with the sort of bad-girl good looks that spell bad luck, this pulp fiction paperback cover painting was deftly painted by Harry Barton in 1955 for the cover of the Ace Double Novel The Squeeze. As the tag line announces this unlucky redhead…”Played With Death To Get The Man She […]
Artist: Harry Barton
In a classic, provocative, and lurid confrontation, Harry Barton shows a fiery redheaded femme-fatale struggling with Joe Chicago, the square-jawed, prizefighting hero of Ross Laurence’s 1953 mobster crime novel The Fast Buck. First published as a part of the Ace Double Novels series, this is a classic example of danger and drama, with provocative undertones, from the down […]
Artist: Harry Barton
A sultry mixed medium paperback cover illustration by Lou Marchetti, this first appeared in 1951 as the paperback cover of Shadow Of The Mafia, aka Horns of the Devil by Louis Malley. The provocative and hard-boiled image shows an “easy loving” blonde beauty flirtatiously eying the streetwise tough Don Alberto, who lays on the bed, his enforcers […]
Artist: Lou Marchetti
It doesn’t get more action packed than this high drama scene of a gangster mol pin-up girl in a shoot out with an unseen mobster trying to push her out of a moving car in a seedy urban Chinatown. An original oil on board artwork by Wil Hulsey, this appeared as the cover of a 1956 issue of Guilty […]
Artist: Wil Hulsey
A dramatic and suspenseful cover paperback painting by the prolific American Illustrator Harry Barton, where train tracks take on an ominous aura, and a deadly outcome appears likely. The cover of an early Ace Double Novel paperback titled Fear No More, written by Leslie Edgley. Illustration is nicely framed and matted behind glass and a […]
Artist: Harry Barton
Grapefruit Moon Gallery is delighted to offer the original 1941 lurid gouache painting by Bill Fleming which appeared as the cover for the early Dell Vest Pocket Paperback book Marihuana, written by Cornell Woolrich under the pen name of William Irish. The cover slug says it all- “A Cheap and evil girl sets a hopped […]
Artist: Bill Fleming
This dramatic and lurid oil painting was created by Rudy Nappi as the original cover for the now-infamous Jane Manning novel Reefer Girl, published by Detective House in New York under the Cameo Books imprint in 1953. The cover slug describes the work as “The frank, biting story of a young girl of the slums, and […]
Artist: Rudy Nappi
The rare surviving cover painting by Frank Paul for the May 1935 edition of Wonder Stories, a futuristic sci-fi pulp title published by Hugo Gernsback. A detailed machine age science minded scene illustrating the interior story “Human Ants” by J. Harvey Haggard. Pictured in this bustling scene is the flight of altruist […]
Artist: Frank Paul
Dating to 1950, this dazzling colorful original paperback cover was painted by George Gross for Quarter Books #57, The Virgin And The Barfly. Illustrating a scene from the novel by Gerald Foster (one of many likely pseudonyms of the prolific Peggy Gladdis), this is a splashy, trashy, and altogether irresistible example of sleaze paperback […]
Artist: George Gross
An inventive stark modernist pin up mixed medium work by the Washington D.C. commercial artist and illustrator Russell Hill. The artist worked in gouache and airbrush to create sleek and unique images of the feminine form that found him much in demand in the advertising world of the 1940s. We have seen other examples […]
Artist: Russell Hill
