Elvgren : His Life & Art Limited Edition of 1950 [Hardcover]

Max Allan Collins (Author), Drake Elvgren (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 1998

This 1998 Editor's Choice Award winner of the Independent Publishing Association quickly sold-out the first printing of 10,000. It is a lively biography on American pin-up artist Gillette Elvgren, a commercial advertising artist of the WWII era. Told by the son of the artist, included are art techniques, pin-up paintings and a behind the scenes personal view of this legendary artist who inspired servicemen worldwide.

--This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Norman Rockwell and Maxfield Parrish may be the best-known American illustrators, but, say this lavish album's authors, had Gil Elvgren "not fallen into creating `pretty girl' calendar and advertising art, he might have earned a reputation to rival Rockwell's." Fortunately, many may think, he did fall. This glowing volume offers an authoritative biography of Elvgren, analysis of his career, and lush reproduction of his work, which, in the '40s and '50s, was everywhere--on Coca-Cola trays and ads, as Brown & Bigelow pinups, and in the auto parts retailer NAPA's calendars. "Elvgren, like Rockwell, is Americana," the authors maintain, "but it is Americana mixed lightly with erotica--an irresistible cocktail." Many of the reproductions are juxtaposed with the photographs of carefully posed models that Elvgren used as templates for his art. Seeing the real and the ideal, photo and painting, together discloses Elvgren's exceptional capability for subtly altering already pretty models' features to produce images of astonishingly bright attractiveness, at once wholesome and sexy. Elvgren was a master, as this book demonstrates. Mike Tribby --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.

Review

".... Long on art, but with enough well written biographical information to qualify it as a good read..." -- International Tattoo Art, January 1999

".... The illustrations reveal Elvgren to be one of the masters of the pretty-girl pin-up commercial art genre..." -- Independent Publisher, November/December 1998

"Elvgren: His Life and Art, by Max Allan Collins and Drake Elvgren (the painter's son), is a gorgeous book." -- San Francisco Examiner Magazine, August 23,1998

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 202 pages
• Publisher: Collectors Pr; De Luxe ed l ed edition (July 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1888054174
• ISBN-13: 978-1888054170
• Product Dimensions: 12.8 x 10.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,906,521 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Max Allan Collins is a New York Times bestselling author of original mysteries, a Shamus award winner and an experienced author of movie adaptions and tie-in novels. His graphic novel ROAD TO PERDITION was made into a major motion picture by Tom Hank's production company, Playtone.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Most comprehensive collection of Elvgren'w work, May 2, 2000

By 

Angel Lee "Liocorno Amethyst Moonstone" (Cleveland, OH United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Elvgren: His Life & Art (Hardcover)

This fabulous volume is surely the most comprehensive collection of Gil Elvgren's work ever assembled in book form. It should go far to establish Elvgren, along with Petty and Vargas, as a master of the American pin-up.

The biographical information is complete and well written including Elvgren's personal, commercial and artistic endeavors. The information on his associations with other pin-up artists of the time is especially interesting.

The importance of Elvgren's models is emphasized, although he painted from photos rather than the live model. In many cases the model's photo and finished painting are side by side showing Elvgren's ability to capture form and expression.

The book includes about 200 of Elvgren's paintings in vibrant full color and covers his advertising work for Coca-Cola and others as well as his famous calendar pin-ups. It is a great source for the pin-up fan, or art historian.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Focuses more on models than paintings, February 8, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Elvgren : His Life & Art Limited Edition of 1950 (Hardcover)

I bought this book expecting to see lots of those great Elvgren paintings at a reasonable size. This book however seems to focus more on the models that Elvgren uses for reference rather than the actual paintings. The book is nice but not exactly what i was looking for.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Weird Religious Spin on this Otherwise Decent book, November 14, 2005

By 

Lowbrow "Lowbrow Art Fiend" (Chilly North) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Elvgren: His Life & Art (Hardcover)

This is a really beautiful book, with nice photos of Elvgren's work and some of his model shots. I was impressed at the layout and the see through tissue paper like illustration designs on some of the chapter headings. But I was very disappointed about a number of things in this book.

Though there are many great pictures of models and many names are listed in the text, the models are not identified in their photos.Worse than this, it seems that this book, co-written by Elvgren's son, Drake Elvgren, has a religious right spin to it which is strange for a number of reasons.

There are many references to Elvgren's "Shame" at his pinup art. Drake (and Collins?) write "If Janet (Elvgren's wife) was bothered by her husband's mildly sinful way of making a living, it created few if any ripples in their Rockwellesque family life." The book also talks about how Elvgren expressed "regret at not doing fine art".

The book also makes a point at talking about how Elvgren became converted at the end of his life to Christianity and this surely seems to have influenced him in his pinup art and life, or so Drake would have us believe.

The overall emphasis is that Elvgren was never alone with his models (being so would have been a sin), that he was a perfect father (except for his "lapses" when he didn't attend some of his kids schooling events), only drank a little (even though he was irritated that when his wife became a Christian she would only drink iced teas at parties or that he seems to have had a reputation as being a "man's man" and a good drinker), and was highly conservative (even though he painted pinup).

The duo also seem to buy into the whole lowbrow/highbrow hierchy that "The Great American Pin-Up" Book (the bible on the genre) tries so hard to dispel. The duo write aboutthe distinction between Elvgren's paintings and Art Frahm's series of pinup paintings which feature women losing their underpants in a series of embarrassing circumstances and how Elvgren would never have "sunk so low" to do such "caricature like paintings".

I am sure Elvgren was a classy and decent man, and a man of his era (so he is excused to a degree for a number of the now non-PC-like paintings he did) but how is it not a caricature when Elvgren typically painted woman in lingerie and high heels doing things that they would be idiotic doing in such clothes. For example, why would a woman be bent over a flaming grill with hardly nothing on? Or why would a obviously grown women in heels and lingerie again, who is crouching on a chair, be scared of a wind-up crocodile toy?? Are women so stupid that when they paint the floor, they paint themselves into a corner? Well, if you are an Elvgren painting, it seems so. But that is what pin-up artists of their day did. They did caricatures. Women were seen as child-like (needing men to take care of them, "of course") and the pinup genre in general is for men to look at them in all their (my) glorious male gaze.

The fact is that caricatures of women are the basis of pin-ups. Shameful? Why yes. Of course, but that was another time and place. The problem with this book is that the authors try to put Elvgren apart from the rest of the pack (maybe because of Drake's christian bent?) even goes on to say how Elvgren would often change the models to by saying he would not "pu himself" so lowly as to do caricatures like artists like Frahm. However, the book also discusses how Elvgren himself elongated his models torsos, shrank their noses, and put 15 year old faces on adult women bodies. Why set apart Elvgren from Frahm by saying one did caricatures and one did not. Why not just say Elvgren was the best at these caricatures and did them classier?

I love Elvgren art. He was a wonderful artist and the best pinup artist of his time. I wish the book would have been more about the art itself and based in more facts of Elvgren's life instead of an obviously skewed retelling by a born again son. I respect Collins truly hope in his next book he won't allow his common sense to fail him again when co-authoring a book with a family member of the subject. I wonder how different this book would have been if he had done this alone? Drake's personal memories of his father could have been kept in without Drake's obvious biases working to "save' his father from what I am sure Drake must see as some sort of minor sin by hios father (thankfully saved by Elvgren's getting reborn 6 months before dying-as the book makes sure to point out!). Drake's characterization of his father is almost nauseating.