Louis K. Meisel Book order

Buxom bombshells: Pictures from an age when eroticism was still innocent They've been exciting generations of men, on calendars and covers, as centrefolds or even on playing cards: pin-ups. What started as an exercise in oils was soon taken up in various media - pin-up mascots graced the fuselages of American fighters, and became an essential feature of the male world of garages and barracks. And the age of political correctness hasn't ended their appeal. This book tells the tale of a genre as utterly American as the paintings of Edward Hopper, describing its origins and development in detail and showcasing the most important artists. With over 500 illustrations, The Great American Pin-Up is a comprehensive studies of the genre. Text in English, French, and German

Post-depression America was in desperate need of a defining iconography that would lift it out of the black and white doldrums, and it came in theform of Gil Elvgren's Technicolor fantasies of the American dream. His technique-which earned him a reputation as "The Norman Rockwell of cheesecake"-involved photographing models and then painting them into gorgeous hyper-reality, with longer legs, more flamboyant hair and gravity-defying busts, and in the process making them the perfect moral-boosting eye-candy for every homesick private.

Post-depression America was in desperate need of a defining iconography that would lift it out of the black and white doldrums, and it came in the form of Gil Elvgren's Technicolor fantasies of the American dream. His technique involved photographing models and then painting them into hyper-reality.

The bold, colourful hand-painted designs that Clarice Cliff combined with outrageous, French-inspired Art Deco shapes evoke all the uninhibited spirit of the 1920s and 30s. She added a new style to pottery decoration: landscapes overflowing with cottages embracing rainbow-coloured trees. In these she transcended Art Deco to give rise to a very British genre of pottery decoration.