Original Art from the Grand Age of American Illustration
The Louis F. Dow Calendar Company of Saint Paul, Minnesota commissioned this pristine and rare surviving pin-up painting by Art Frahm for publication in their 1944 calendar line under the title “Pay Off.” The image shows an underdressed, impish redhead having an “oops” moment as she is drenched by the puppy she has just so carefully bathed. This painting is […]
Artist: Art Frahm
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
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
This breezy sailor girl, bathing beauty pin-up graced the cover of the July 24, 1937 edition of Liberty magazine, a popular long running Bernarr MacFadden publication. By the artist R.C. Kauffmann–a personal favorite of the gallery–this is a tremendously spirited, large format oil painting with spectacular zest and allure. Kauffmann is best remembered for his Saturday Evening Post covers as […]
Artist: R.C. Kauffmann
Sam Cherry created this romance-themed Western pulp painting for use as the June, 1943 cover of Thrilling Ranch Stories – Romantic Stories of The West. The image shows a pretty blonde sweetheart of the rodeo embracing a Wild West town sheriff, who grins as he contemplates his great luck. Not only did he seemingly get the girl, a bullet aimed at […]
Artist: Sam Cherry
A large and important bustling published colorful gouache illustration painting by Willy Pogany for an interior story titled “Nero’s Temple On The Nile”, which appeared in the January 12, 1947 edition of Randolph Hearst’s American Weekly Magazine. An over the top opulant Egyptian themed costumed imagining of life in ancient Rome, which appeared with the […]
Artist: Willy Pogany
A rare surviving c. 1910 large pastel illustration by the well listed and prolific illustrator Frederick Duncan. The sporty yet flirty glamour girl co-ed with a school book and a tennis racket personifies the socially progressive, daring and active woman who was coming into fashion as the voluptuous ideal of the Victorian woman of means waned. Works like this by Duncan, a cover artist for The Saturday Evening Post, popularized this independent, carefree vision of womanhood.
Artist: Frederick Duncan
This luminous, expressive oil on masonite was created as an interior story illustration by beloved american artist Tom Lovell, which has verso notations which lead us to believe this was published in the May, 1947 edition of American Magazine, a title the artist frequently worked for. A young snappily attired couple are shown surrendering to the […]
Artist: Tom Lovell
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
A 1949 Western Americana cowgirl themed gouache on illustration board which comes directly from the archives of the 100-year-old San Francisco ad agency/lithography company “Stecher-Traung & Schmidt.” The work is in the style of George Petty, and Ben-Hur Baz. Among other noted artists Stecher-Traug employed Gil Elvgren, E.B. Segner & Mary Mayo. This commissioned illustration is dated and inkstamped in the lower corner but is unsigned. Work is beautifully framed and matted in a period ornate gesso frame.
Artist: Unknown
