Original Art from the Grand Age of American Illustration
Risqué and fetching maidens have always been popular artistic subjects and the perfect vehicle to advertise just about any product, add allure to any magazine, or brighten any calendar. In the 1930s, Rolf Armstrong and Billy Devorss’s Art Deco sophisticates were everyone’s dream girl. During World War II, George Petty and Alberto Vargas created patriotic lithe modernist heartbreakers for the pages of Esquire Magazine to keep servicemen company, and soon there was a calendar girl for every taste--whether you preferred the girl next door or the one from the wrong side of the tracks. In post-war America, the youthful spirit personified by Earl Moran’s cheesecake depictions of Marilyn Monroe reigned, and pin up and glamour art remained unflaggingly popular. Today, original pin up and glamour art is more coveted by collectors than ever, and its influence on contemporary fashion, art, and culture is everywhere.
A World War II-era illustration painting for the Nehi brand ginger ale Par-T-Pak. An early soda sold in quart size bottles intended to be shared, in this case by a breezy pin-up girl and her handsome enlisted beau. The saucy, double entendré tagline reads Neat Treat In The Heat! and as the flirtatious glance suggests, things are indeed about […]
Artist: Frederick Sands Brunner
A wonderful vignette styled oil on canvas illustration painting by Gil Elvgren showing a young, stylish and very much in love couple in a warm clinch. This is of unknown publication usage. It is signed in the lower right corner “Elvgren” but the signature has been overpainted (shortly after this was painted […]
Artist: Gil Elvgren
In this signed oil on illustration board painting by William Medcalf, a breezy young blonde pin-up dream girl is seen contently sipping Grapette Soda on a bustling summer day as a man in the background prepares a sailboat, presumably to take her out for a lovely day on the lake. This large […]
Artist: William Medcalf
A deliriously sexy and important surviving pin-up painting by Haddon Sundblom, created in the 1940s for the U.O. Colson Calendar Company of Paris, Illinois. A pretty blonde nude model admires her abundant beauty in an aptly titled vanity mirror, with unique to this artist skin tones and brush strokes in alla prima, that are unequaled in […]
Artist: Haddon Sundblom
This seductive, newly unearthed Henry Clive illustration painting was created as the cover for the July 23, 1933 edition of The American Weekly, a Randolph Hearst publication. The magazine often commissioned Clive to create serialized images of enchantresses that shared a thematic thread. In this case, cosmopolitan exotic beauties in the crossfire of cupid’s bow. For this, the […]
Artist: Henry Clive
An Art Deco era, golden age Henry Clive illustration painting that appeared as the cover for the June 11,1933 edition of The American Weekly, a Randolph Hearst publication. The magazine often commissioned Clive to create serialized images of enchantresses that shared a thematic thread. In this case, foreign beauties caught in the crossfire of cupid’s bow. A […]
Artist: Henry Clive
This is a beautiful, unique, and rare preliminary graphite drawing by Gil Elvgren for the completed Brown & Bigelow calendar artwork titled “Let’s Go Around Together.” This loose, fluid sketch shows a classic Elvgren pin-up flashing her shapely gams from her perch astride a carousel horse. Gil Elvgren took, on average, one […]
Artist: Gil Elvgren
This is a beautiful, unique, and rare preliminary graphite drawing by Gil Elvgren for the completed Brown & Bigelow calendar artwork titled “Modern Venus.” This loose, fluid sketch shows a classic Elvgren nude pin-up girl seated in a draped studio setting surrounded by flowers and holding draped fabrics and ribbons. Gil Elvgren […]
Artist: Gil Elvgren
This is a beautiful, unique, and rare preliminary graphite drawing by Gil Elvgren that shows the behind-the-scenes process that the artist went through while coming up with and subsequently presenting ideas to Brown & Bigelow for potential calendar artwork. This includes Elvgren’s handwritten notations in the bottom right of the drawing to […]
Artist: Gil Elvgren
This original fine art figure study by the pre-eminent pin-up illustrator comes from a collection of Gil Elvgren preliminary graphite drawings that we acquired which were found in a house in Sarasota, Florida where the artist once lived. With restraint and a detailed eye towards anatomy, the artist captures a brunette with a contemplative pose, […]
Artist: Gil Elvgren
