Original Art from the Grand Age of American Illustration
A subversive and suggestive gouache painting by Isabel Dawson which appeared as the cover of the Stallion Books paperback Trailer Camp Girl, a 1953 offering written by Doug Duperault. The text slugs reads : “They Called Her A Trailer Tramp – A Story of The Carefree Women Who Live – And Love – In Trailer Camps…” Painting has […]
Artist: Isabel Dawson
This electric and inventive progress-through-industry themed gouache painting by Mahlon Blaine is signed and dated 1955. The image dramatizes the industrial era with a shirtless industrial worker forging steel in a machine-age apocalyptic scene that draws its light and intensity and sense of movement from the fire’s sparking glow emitted from within an ominous furnace.
Artist: Mahlon Blaine
This large, colorful, and bustling painting by the prolific American artist Louis Glanzman appeared in the April 26, 1952 issue of Collier’s magazine, illustrating “Honkytonk – U.S.A.” by William Slocum. In this scathing analysis, the honkytonk is described in great and scandalous detail as a lawless den of sin, whose unscrupulous owners prey on male weakness, hiring low-class strippers […]
Artist: Louis Glanzman
In this gouache-on-board cover illustration for 1952’s The Scarlet Slipper, James Meese captures the unique mixture of the American homestead with a tough-talking private eye in the mix.
Artist: James Alfred Meese
Bold, large and provocative, a sensational scandalous paperback cover painting by Rudy Nappi which was created for use as the cover of French Alley by Matthew Clay. Part of the Star Novels series of digest sized paperbacks released by Publication House, NYC, this steamy novel follows the proclivities of three young attractive women who endure heartbreak and discover rapture […]
Artist: Rudy Nappi
In this humorous yet disturbing original illustration, artist Stan Galli captures the exasperation of an archetypical housewife in the baby boom years.
Artist: Stanley Galli
A subversive youth gone wild party scene original cover painting by Peter Driben likely used for a paperback book title published by the Novel Library imprint. During the 1950s a hedonistic bohemian fictional sub-culture existed where teens smoked reefer and engaged in orgiastic exploits while becoming addicted to heroin. In showing these delinquents pursuing their darkest sinful desires, the illustrators of the day seemed to take great joy and this is a prime example of this sort of homage to debauchery.
Artist: Peter Driben
“Eyes That Invite” is a colorful and classic 1950 original glamour girl pin-up pastel by Pearl Frush and published by the Gerlach-Barklow Calendar Company of Joliet Illinois. This was gifted by a salesman at Gerlach-Barklow to the Robberson Steel Company of Oklahoma City in appreciation for their lucrative advertising account.
Artist: Pearl Frush
A sexy and mod late 1950s gouache illustration on board by Arnold Kohn that we believe to have been used as a pin-up calendar commission.
Artist: Arnold Kohn
This cover painting by Tom Beecham for True Strange magazine is comprised of a montage of Marilyn Monroe imagery.
Artist: Tom Beecham
