Hugh Hefner's Copy of Fornicon by Tomi Ungerer

Tomi Ungerer's Fornicon (1969) has not become less disturbing in the fifty years since its unlikely publication. It's precisely-imagined depictions of mechanized genital stimulation may even have gained some new resonance in our own deeply-troubled age saturated in impersonal internet pornography. This is not a book I've ever desired to own, not even in my sexually-curious youth, but if I were going to conceal a copy in my personal library I don't think I could find a more apt one than that belonging to Playboy magazine's founder and publisher Hugh Hefner. It's actually from the limited edition of 500—five-hundred!—signed and numbered, but not personalized. Still, with the link between illustrator and publisher it's quite an association copy. Frankly, it's hard to see from Fornicon how Hefner made use of Ungerer's esthetic in his magazine depicting "the girl next door," but Ungerer was certainly capable of producing a wide variety of images, a great many of which could be safely mass-marketed.

The first eBay photograph is one I could never have imagined: Hugh Hefner's copy of Fornicon displayed atop Senator John F. Kennedy's Profiles in Courage!

For the record, I could never have imagined the remainder of the eBay photographs either.

Tomi Ungerer
eBay Listing Retrieved June 24, 2019

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Tomi-Ungerer-FORNICON-Signed-1st-Edition-1970/202637422523?hash=item2f2e21afbb:g:26MAAOSw3AFcnApU

Tomi Ungerer
eBay Item Description

N-gram:  Hugh Hefner and Tomi Ungerer

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MoCCA Fest 2018: Not Waving But Drawing by John Cuneo

It is said that Bach could improvise at or above the level of his musical compositions. John Cuneo, I would argue, produces seemingly spontaneous sketchbook drawings that are at least as intriguing  as his finished illustrations. It's a good bet that the artist's sketchbook drawings are unlike anything else you have encountered. They are intensely personal yet broadly relatable, arcane yet accessible, erotic yet grotesque, morbid yet hilarious. To me, they somehow recall the sketches of Heinrich Kley and Auguste Rodin in their technical prowess and ability to surprise, yet they have an esthetic and a character that is all their own. And now we have a book full of 'em!

John Cuneo
Not Waving But Drawing:  Dark Thoughts, Lightly Rendered
Seattle:  F.U. Press, 2016

Signed and personalized with a drawing by John Cuneo

Note:  David Apatoff's unsurpassed Illustration Art blog is as fine a place as any to learn more about the work of John Cuneo. He always loved larking.

This week's posts are devoted to the fascinating items I collected at MoCCA Fest 2018.


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Sight Unseen: An Otto Soglow Erotic Drawing

When I gamble, I don't need to go to a casino; I go to an online bookseller and buy something I can't personally examine. The wager is that a bookseller who won't go to the trouble of providing a photo will nevertheless accurately describe a book. My bets in book buying have overall been fairly successful so far, with one or two odd caveats. Win or lose, I report on the results of my blind purchases right here on the blog. Today I report on my most expensive experiment to date, a sight unseen copy of Fortieth Anniversary of the Dutch Treat Club (New York, 1945). As noted in the Strand Book Store listing, the publication is limited to 1000 copies and this volume is inscribed by Otto Soglow with an erotic drawing. The price is $125. Okay, I decided to go for it.

Abe Books Listing
August 7, 2016

The book has voyeuristic cover art by John Falter, a regular Saturday Evening Post cover artist.

Fortieth Anniversary of the Dutch Treat Club

John Falter

New York, 1945, cover

The endpapers are by Dean Cornwell, another outstanding contributor.

Endpaper
Dean Cornwell

The Soglow drawing appears in the front of the book on a blank page opposite a printed erotic drawing of a woman wearing only panties, a skirt, and heels, immodestly bending over. Soglow has drawn his Little King staring very specifically at her crotch and experiencing a visible bulge in his royal robe. Humorist Corey Ford has also signed the page and directed a comment at the same area of the woman's anatomy. What a coincidence!

Inscribed "With love to Harry [Staton?]/O. Soglow" with a drawing of the Little King aroused
Inscribed "The usual place/Corey Ford—"

The drawing is inscribed to one Harry. It seems likely but by no means certain that this is Harry Staton, who managed the Herald Tribune Syndicate and served as Treasurer of the Dutch Treat Club.

Among the listed officers of the Dutch Treat Club is Treasurer Harry Staton (c. 1880- 1959), possibly the original owner of this volume. Harry Staton was the manager of the Herald Tribune Syndicate from 1924-1947. Note the classy medicine cabinet.

Many of the artists in the Dutch Treat Club contributed a drawing with the theme of the number forty. Here is Otto Soglow's anatomical capriccio to end the volume:

So here's my take on this purchase: I got my money's worth, but to what end? This book is an absolutely unique item in a number of ways. It is perhaps Soglow's only drawing of the Little King in a sexually-aroused state—heaven forfend if there are more—and it is an unexpected bonus to see it paired, if crudely, with Corey Ford's signature. The likely provenance of Harry Staton makes it even more interesting. I have no doubt it's worth $125.

On the down side, it is a dated relic of an old boys' club of cartoonists and humorists. Soglow and Ford are looking for coarse laughs in the objectification of women. I love the Little King, but this isn't the Little King drawing I would choose for myself. In fact, I'm pretty sure I would have passed on the book if I'd actually seen it. But then, what was I expecting?

Note:  It's not so hard for a determined collector to find an absolutely unique drawing. In fact, it's quite easy, because cartoonists and other creative people conjure up absolutely unique images every day. Readers who have accumulated unique artifacts of the Dutch Treat Club are encouraged to share them right here on Attempted Bloggery.

It seems almost every day I ask for scans or photographs of original cartoon art by Otto Soglow. I usually ask for examples of extremely rare and obscure published work. Today I offered a little of each myself. See, it isn't so hard. Well, I suppose that depends on what I mean by it.


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Resplendent Subtlety

Welcome to the world's most popular cultural blog! Please, there's no need to thank me.

You know, if there's one complaint I get more than any other—and I get plenty, believe me—it's that I have a tendency here on the old blog to overindulge in what might be called gross-out humor. Too often, my numerous critics tell me, I emphasize only the obvious, the offensive, the scatological, eschewing the nuanced and the refined—qualities wrongly thought not to be in my wheelhouse—in favor of the tasteless, the crass, or the frankly disgusting. In short, I am accused of pandering to the lowbrow tastes of my audience for the mere sake of maintaining what I concede is an already wildly-lucrative blog. While I am not totally blameless in all this, I have to admit I'm a little hurt by the constant criticism of my crudeness. Well, friends, that ends today.

Why today? Because, having duly checked my calendar, I see that today is the first day of the 2017 MoCCA Arts Festival, a two-day comics extravaganza held on the West Side of New York City not too far from the Intrepid. Last year I attended the 2016 Festival, if only for a couple of hours, and photographed a rather refined piece of original illustration art by the great Rick Meyerowitz, "O Tempore! O Sophomore!"—a classy Latin title if ever there was one. Now, one full year later, I am finally posting this bounteously-overflowing work to help promote the new 2017 MoCCA Arts Fest and to usher in a new, more genteel phase of my blogging. Can you scent the change? At last I can indulge my true predilection—too often suppressed in the past—for the subtle, for the serene, for the sublime. No longer will anyone be able to say that urbane sophistication and refinement are simply not to be found in my Milhouse.

Rick Meyerowitz
"O Tempore! O Sophomore!"
Original art
National Lampoon, August 1972

I don't know if I'm going to make it over to MoCCA Fest this year—I'm trying to keep a low profile in the face of so much public opprobrium—but if I do manage it on Sunday, the day they let in the riff-raff, please say hello and do try to be a little forgiving. I'll be the one not wearing a white carnation.

Becky Cloonan, MoCCA Fest 2017

April 2, 2017 Update: Well, I never made it over there, but if you said hi to me anyway, thanks.


Note:  Rick Meyerowitz has never appeared on this blog before, but, as I've said, I'm turning over a new leaf as of today.

Richard M. Nixon was the 37th President of the United States. Respect.


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Nude with The New Yorker

Today is a clothing-optional day here on the blog. I hope you didn't overdress.

A series of four anonymous vintage nude photographs from the 1950's were sold on eBay in March of 2014. These black and white photos shot in an unkempt apartment strike one immediately as the work of an amateur. They are severely lit and the subject is overexposed—no pun intended. Still they merit a blog post here because in the first of these photos the model is posed with a copy of our favorite magazine, The New Yorker. Yes, The New Yorker. She smiles and appears to be enjoying herself. Perhaps she is reading Thurber.

Now of course I know a studio prop when I see one. Nevertheless, I see no reason not to believe that this young woman was an avid reader and that she proved to be a lifelong devotee of the magazine. She might be about 80 now and, based on the limited evidence, just perhaps enjoying the fruits of a literary and no doubt adventurous life.

—Oh, I almost forgot. Happy Father's Day, everyone!

Vintage nude posed with The New Yorker, c. 1954.

Just take a look at that sickly houseplant! The issue of The New Yorker works far better as a studio prop.

Vintage nude, c. 1954
That radiator isn't much better than the houseplant.

Vintage nude, c. 1954

I'm beginning to suspect the photographer wasn't too interested in the backgrounds.

Vintage nude, c. 1954
She's pretty. I don't think the photographer was able to do her justice.

Although the eBay item title reads "1940's," the magazine issue in the photo dates from 1954.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lot-of-4-1940s-Vintage-Original-Photos-Busty-Hairy-Nude-Pinup-Reads-New-Yorker-/131133415903?pt=Art_Photo_Images&hash=item1e882921df&nma=true&si=UB68sj2DvLx%252F9kdb54zXrlCgzYs%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

EBay Item Description

EBay Bid History

[End of eBay listing] 

Abe Birnbaum, The New Yorker, August 21, 1954

Vintage nude posed with The New Yorker of August 21, 1954.

Note: Sorry, there simply are no other blog posts here quite like this one, but there is one other post I also consider not safe for work. Feel free to check it out, but only if you're not working.

Was this Abe Birnbaum's finest hour? Perhaps I should rephrase the question. Would you like to see more of the New Yorker art of Abe Birnbaum?

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Just Another Spring Day in Central Park

Four years ago, I went for a walk in Central Park and did a little people-watching. There may have been some unusual goings on, but I didn't really know what to make of it at the time and I still don't. These photographs document two separate events that I witnessed as I walked around the Reservoir. This was on or around May 1, 2009. I believe one event was meant to be humorous, and the other was meant to be artistic, or perhaps promotional. Even here I'm far from certain.

Note that in each instance, you can see someone else photographing the same subject. The people in the park wanted to be seen and photographed! The group wearing sadomasochistic dress and playacting the provision of transportation services attracted the attention of another photographer in my third and fourth photos. In the case of the woman wearing almost nothing but body paint, there were actually about a dozen other photographers standing next to me, all of them men. Go figure. Some of their camera equipment looked professional, so this may have been a publicity event. That would explain it, I suppose. I have some advice for the model, by the way: don't wear fall colors in the spring.

Note:  If you know more than I do about what transpired one fine spring day in Central Park four years ago and the uninhibited people I photographed, please feel free to leave an informative comment.

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