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 woman in peril, menace themed proposed spicy pulp oil painting by the American illustrator William Soare is a lurid and provocative example of the damsel in distress imagery which proliferated newsstands in the 1930s. To the best of our research, this pulp cover illustration appears to have never been published, which sometimes happened when the fly-by-night titles that commissioned these spicy […]
Artist: William Soare
In this original oil on canvas pulp painting by Harold McCauley, used as the cover for the November, 1954 pulp digest, Imaginative Tales #2, a near nude runaway pin-up girl seductively rides a speeding red bullet – with the next stop being the moon… Created to illustrate an interior serialized novella story by Charles F. […]
Artist: Harold McCauley
This oil on canvasboard painting by Harold (H.W.) McCauley was created for use as the cover for the 1959 Nightstand digest pulp novel Carnival of Lust by J.X. Williams. In this offering a near-nude harem girl flirtatiously eyes a martini drinking genie. The painting is a dynamic and well-rendered example by this prolific and gifted American illustrator, and a great artifact […]
Artist: Harold McCauley
A remarkable and early oil on illustration board painting by the well listed east coast artist Charles Fracé, likely created in the 1950s as a paperback book cover. A desperate, love-struck couple steal an impassioned last moment together as a blizzard rages around them in this tense dramatic and inventive early offering. This is unsigned […]
Artist: Charles Fracé
A lurid, true crime themed, spicy pulp cover pin-up painting by George Gross featuring a bathing beauty, gun toting moll as “The Daughter of Satan,” for the March, 1948 pulp digest title Women in Crime which purported to have stories based on True Fact Detective Cases. The tagline on the cover reads “Some Women Love To […]
Artist: George Gross
Fred Rodewald created this classic and exciting 1940s pulp cover painting for an as of yet unidentified Thrilling Publications Western title. The image shows a handsome cowboy returning gunfire while precariously perched on a fallen log, protecting the requisite damsel in distress. The scene is filled with tension, romance, and danger, a combination which American […]
Artist: Fred Rodewald
This exciting Western pulp oil on stretched painting appeared was created as cover art for the fall 1942 issue of the Thrilling Publications Western title Exciting Western. The scene shows a handsome cowboy and smartly attired cowgirl returning fire on unseen villains in this tautly rendered, action packed, bright and bold image. Grapefruit Moon Gallery […]
Artist: Earle K. Bergey
An action packed damsel in distress fire rescue pulp cover painting by Sam Cherry for the February 1943 issue of Thrilling Ranch Stories – Romantic Stories of The West. A fearless square jawed handsome cowboy emerges from a burning building with a damsel in his arms, his pistol a blazin’, as our felled damsel struggles to regain […]
Artist: Sam Cherry
An unsigned oil on stretched canvas pulp cover painting for the December 1947 issue of the Thrilling Publications Western title Thrilling Western. A rugged square jawed handsome cowboy with a noose around his neck engages in a barbed wire shoot out illustrating the interior story Bullets and Salt by Bradford Scott. The stories tag-line as follows … When […]
Artist: Sam Cherry, Atrributed
This remarkable gouache pulp cover painting by Alex Schomburg appeared on the February, 1961 issue of the long running Ziff-Davis magazine Amazing Stories – Fact And Science Fiction. Though the work seems like pure fantasy at first glance, it is based on the real-life practice of both the American and Soviet space programs of sending mice, dogs, chimpanzees and animals into space to […]
Artist: Alex Schomburg
