I have an odd fondness for the old 1950’s fetish artists and illustrators. The quality of their work is often pretty variable, the sexual politics archaic and the subjects tame by today’s standards. Compared to modern artists like Sardax and Shiniez the work doesn’t do much for more erotically and yet, despite that, I enjoy looking at it. There’s a sense of fun and quirkiness that’s missing in the more explicit work of today. I suspect that’s down to the legal constraints that they had to operate under and the limited fetish material available at the time. There weren’t well defined niches and ready made markets for them. They had to make it up as they went along.
If you share my interest in this period then I’d direct you to this article by Jim Linderman. It describes how he stumbled across artists like Gene Bilbrew and the colorful cast of characters that hung out around 42nd Street in NYC. There’s also a gallery of artwork and a book that he’s put together on the topic.
My absolute favorite drawing of those in the gallery is probably this one. It’s got sci-fi, bondage, fetishism and vintage fashion all mixed into a very bizarre scene. However, it’s not really femdom, so to illustrate the post I’ve gone with a different drawing from the gallery. I’m not really sure what’s going on, but that’s part of the appeal of these one off book covers.
I was amused to spot in the comments to the Guardian article somebody complaining that the paper never featured modern artists like Sardax. I’m not going to hold my breath for that to happen but I do agree. Not sure if robbo100 is a reader of this blog but it made me smile to see another femdom artist aficionado pop-up in an unexpected place.