Today is National Legwear Day! Enoch Bolles has them covered

 

Today's celebration is right up our man Enoch's alley. While painting covers for Filim Fun and other magazines in the 1920s Enoch had a busy side gig going in the advertising field. I've posted examples of his trolley card work and a few example of his fashion illustrations, but had intended to save his hosiery box art for the Bolles book (which is back in play) until now. On this special day I couldn't resist and we see what I consider a masterpiece of ilustration art. Or as they used to say, she's the knees bees!

Bolles did box art for other stocking companies, many but not all of which feature the same model. The example below is an exception, and one I feel is particularly charming. It's chock fully of Bolles' stylistic flourishes. How many can you find? No examples of the original art of this work have yet been found, but there is always hope.

  

September 12 is National Police Women Day

 Our rather aerodynamically uniformed Bolles girl is hot on the chase. She looks pretty determined despite those high heal leather boots. Could this theme be another of Enoch's firsts? As hard as I've looked I've yet to find an earlier biker girl pinup. Bolles included another first in this image. Less obvious but no less notable, the "speed lines", also known as Hites. First appearing in cartoons published in the 1880s, they were used not only to depict fast moving objects but an entire range of movements, emotions and energy (I saw an entire exhibit on them at the fabulous Billy Ireland Museum of Cartooning). This is the only example I've found by Bolles and the next time it appeared in a pinup was 35 years later! 

It's an Elvgren girl suffering from the usual challenge of keeping her clothes on. Aside from the flowing hair and just a hint of a speed line coming off the mirror and back tire, there's not much to suggest she's more than puttering along (especially on a 100cc Yamaha Twin Jet). Take a look at the reference photo and you'll see that the kickstand is down. Janet Rae, the great Elvgren model is in no actualy danger (this is also a good example of how closely Elvgren worked from photo references). 

The biker girl trope continues to show up now and then in pinup, but has played more prominantly in popular music. Artists such as Britney Spears and Pink have gone down the road as a biker girl (though Britney clearly could use some riding lessons) and Madonna has featured the leather biker girl look throughout her long career. They look great, but if you ask me our Bolles biker girl has left them all in the dust. 

May 25 is also Towel day! Bolles has her covered.

 Here's a rather unusual composition by Bolles that often either goes unattributed or sometimes ascribed to Earle Bergey. The latter connection could be understood. Aside from working on several of the same titles, Bergey often worked in complete backgrounds, some verging on photorealistic. But despite the similarities, this is most definitetly by our man Bolles. The main reason this image is so atypical is that Enoch used a reference photo for the cover, something he rarely resorted to. And when I dig it up I'll add it to this post. 

Finally, we have below the only other towel wearing Bolles girl I've found, published three years earlier in a 1929 issue. Her situation is a bit more precarious, but clearly it must have been an important call. 

December 11 is National Stretching Day: Enoch Bolles has you covered!

Who would have thought that our man Enoch would have painted a cover to celebrate National Stretching Day?!  This appeared in 1934 and if you are familiar with the title you'll know it was one of the under the counter magazines that Bolles did covers for. Moreover, nearly all the covers featured Bolles girls in contortionistic poses, this cover being the most suitable for gym class (and a general audience). Yoga Day is coming up later in December and there's another Cupid's Caper cover involving a very advanced yoga pose, but it's also Monkey Day and Enoch did not one but two covers with monkeys. And then Flashlight Day is also coming up, and there's a perfect Bolles covers for that and what about... Decisions, decisions.
 

Happy Belated New Year, courtesy Enoch Bolles

  A bit late but worth the wait. This new year's greeting from our man Enoch is doubly special. Not only is it a rare example of two Bolles girls adorning a cover, it's the first "new" cover discovery in over four years. 

Laughter was a monthly humor magazine that lasted for barely over a year and Bolles painted nearly all of the covers. Unlike his other magazine assignments during this period, Bolles applied dramatic backgrounds for all of his Laughter covers. This addition brings the count of Bolles magazine covers to 581. Let's hope that there are more to be found!

Yet Another Swipe

Today's entry features perhaps Enoch's best cover for Judge, the magazine that launched his career as a cover artist back a decade earlier in 1914. The theme of dancers doing the Can-Can brings to mind cover art to French magazines of the time such as La Vie Parisienne and Le Sourire which featured the works of talented artists who specialized in the female form, particularly George Barbier, Chéri Herouard, Georges Léonnec. I'm not alone in wondering if our man Enoch may have been influenced by their creations, particularly covers such as this where his girls look like they could be kicking up their heels in the Moulin Rouge. Bolles produced other examples in the 1920s that seemed to have a bit of French flair to them.

I've long kept an eye out for any whiff of a connection, be it a hint of inspiration or wholesale imitation. And finally, I've uncovered the smoking gun, but it was pointed in the wrong direction. It turns out it wasn't Bolles who was being influenced. This double truck illustration appeared in Le Sourier five years after Bolles painted his dance line. The poses of the first four girls on the left match up closely with the Judge ' cover, and the differences are most evident in their faces and headdresses. The remainder of the lineup is a variation on a single pose. So while clearly not an exact duplicate, the work certainly qualifies as a serious swipe.

 

     

Bolles' influence on American pinup illustrators has been well documented, the surprise is that he also had an impact on the French school, especially given the ephemeral nature of periodicals like Judge. The covers of  unsold magazines were typically torn off by distributors, and the daughter of one of his Enoch's art editors once told me that he would home stacks of magazines to burn in their fireplace. It makes one wonder how any copies ever made it across the pond.
 

Enoch Bolles has teed up for Women's Golf Day

After a hiatus our man Bolles is back on the course and teeing up for today's official celebration of Women's Golf Day. But don't be mistaken, this 1936 cover of Spicy Stories is nowhere near the first time a Bolles girl showed up on the fairway. 

The earliest example appeared in 1925 on the cover of Laughter, a short-lived humor rag very much along the lines of Judge, the magazine where Bolles began his career and was still doing the occasional cover for. His covers for Laughter represent a real departure, not thematically but because of the total absence of white backgrounds. Instead Bolles uncharacteristically turned to saturated primaries and deep hues that completely filled the backgrounds.  

The final example for today appeared a year earlier, not on a magazine but from what was then called a Street car card. During this time Bolles was not only churning out covers for several monthly and bi-monthly periodicals but also painting scores of ads that were slotted in the space above windows in trolleys and busses. Many of these images were dramatically rescaled for other uses from blotters to billboards. Bolles plays it straight with this image but he played with a variety of looks and other examples toe closer to the style of the Laughter cover.    

But despite these and other examples, Bolles never once set foot on a golf course.