Vintage Illustration

The other day I encouraged the girls to go on a treasure hunt in the attic of our new old house. On second thought, that could be a dangerous prospect. I hope the former owners didn't keep a stash of antique porn up there.
Thankfully they've only found a few really old moth eaten clothes and books and papers. This time they came back with a stack of five Ladies Home Journals from 1932 and 1933. Except for the two on the top, they're in good condition.
Reading through them is like going back in time. It is interesting to see that what was important to Americans 75 years ago is pretty much the same today. Many of the ads are about staying young and attractive, feeding your family on a budget, and keeping your children healthy. The messages in Rachel Ray's magazine are the same today, just with different products and claims.
What was amazing was the sheer number of beautiful illustrations in each issue. Today when we think of illustration of this period, we think of the superstars like Rockwell, Lagatta, and Lyondecker. Each LHJ was packed with editorial illustration, spot illustration, fashion illustration and of course, advertising illustration. There were more illos than there were photos. Some of them were so beautifully composed that I wondered if the original may be hanging in a museum some where. I think about these pictures and what was going on in fine art world at the time and I know where I'd have wanted to have been.
Oh, who am I kidding? If I were alive in the 30's, I'd probably live in a shack with 17 kids and a husband who likes my biscuits.
OK, I know this is a photo and NOT illustration, but I liked the ad... too funny.

This little spot illustrations gave no artist credit. I found them interesting because this style looks about 25 years ahead of it's time. I have dozens of cookbooks from the 50's that use this flat two color style.

Someone got to paint a delicious lemon layer cake. I have a lot of old cookbooks from the 20's and 30's that used illustrations instead of photos. I wonder why they didn't take photos for these purposes?
The handling of watercolor is superb in this picture. Me loves everything about it! Maybe I will get the chance to imitate this style sometime... no wait, pay HOMAGE to this style, LOL.

The next three pictures were credited to The Billmeyers. I am guessing this may have been a husband and wife illustrating team. I am going to Wiki them and see what I can find out. More on them later.

I love this decorative composition. I had to be inspired at least a little bit by Alphonse Mucha.


Henry Raliegh... love the paint handling here too. I would love to see the original version of this up close. Maybe I could steal some secrets.


Here are two John Lagattas... I bet he was just cranking 'em out and cashing the checks back in the day. Still, they are beautifully done and simply elegant. I am going to show them to the girls as examples of what can be done with charcoal or graphite washes. They need to think about something other than anime.

I wish these were in better shape.



Perfect Biscuits... don't they have surgery for that nowadays?
Oh well, I had better stop goofing off and get back to the cookbook project.