National Pie Day: Bolles abides!

Have a Snappy Christmas!

Take a Friendly Swipe

I generally take a dim view of artists' attempts at swiping Bolles, as Enoch himself did.  His grandson told me how he'd rail against other artists he felt were swiping his stuff.  Even the editors of Film Fun noticed and in the mid-30s initiated a lawsuit against the magazine, Movie Humor, in large part no doubt because of George Quintana's line by line ripoffs of Bolles' covers (and if you are wondering why I refer to him as Quintana and not Quantance, the author Dian Hanson will be coming out with her take on the debate later this year in her new pinup book). Although the suit against Movie Humor was denied, the presiding judge granted a temporary injunction because of the "confusingly similar cover format." 

I take exception, however, to the lively interpretation of a classic 1937 Bolles cover you see here. I first came across it in an article in the New York Times article on a company that reproduces old menus for a line of products and of course I had to investigate further (as if there was a choice).  The image was the cover to the Latin Quarter restaurant and was appeared around 1950, though it seems for more contemporary to me. Although the artist, Vanni Cola (I've had no luck tracking down any info on her/him) accurately followed the composition, the simplified color scheme and strong use of red works really well. I also like the bulls-eye, which was a visual trope Bolles used many times. And the way the typeface (hand drawn?) is worked into the image aces it. 

So I contacted the friendly folds at Cool Culinaria and we had a lively discussion on the intersection of our mutual interests that led to a blog post about it on their site.

Finally, the klutzy pinup theme of this cover--while pretty much the rule for the likes of Elvgren and others--is relatively rare for Bolles. Limiting my search to Film Fun, I found no examples at all until 1932 and only five total out of over 200 covers. Curious two of the first three covers by substitute artists for the magazine used klutzy themes.

Happy Halloween!

October 21: Reptile Awareness Day

Our Bolles girl is the embodiment of reptile awareness.  This image appeared on the February 1924, the year Bolles took over as sole cover artist for Film Fun. It was a very inventive period for Enoch and he produced several other gangbuster covers that year.  While it may seem that scaly creatures would make anything but an endearing prop for pinups, Bolles revisited the reptile theme several more times during his career.  He not only pulled another croc out of his alligator suitcase of props but also employed snakes and turtles. In fact he did more covers with reptiles than with puppies.
 

While our flapper has a bad case of herpetophobia the Bolles girl on the right certainly isn't shedding any tears over her pet crocodile. The image was used in a series of ink blotters featuring artwork by Bolles but as far as I know was never appeared on the cover of a magazine.










And to finish on a high note, here's a charmer whose seriously wrapped up with serpent awareness. 

 

 

 

Wrecking Ball



What is it with Miley?  She needs to enlarge her fashion sense beyond the same pale underthings and take a fashion cue from our Bolles girl, who demonstrates how to ride a wrecking ball in style and sure-handed authority. Her jaunty work uniform looks right in place on the job site, and unlike Miley she took the time to lace up her boots.  Some time back I wrote about another underdressed girl of the music scene who seems to have picked up on up some Bolles girl poses and the post got a notice in Esquire magazine. They were a bit ambivalent about the connection, but that's not about to stop me from looking. The Bolles girl lives on! 

Aviation Day!

A great Bolles cover to celebrate Aviation Day, a theme that he revisited a number of times over the years.  Sorry for the long layover but my carrier has experienced some mechanical difficulties.  We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused in your viewing pleasure.