Bill Kresse Modern 1950s Cartoonist

Something different today. A piece I wrote for my defunct Vintage Sleaze blog over ten years ago. If ever there was a cartoonist from the 1950s deserving a retrospective showing at the Drawing Center, it would be Bill Kresse. As modern as a Herman Miller Eames chair and just as timeless, his early gag work for sleazy digests stands out for many reasons. Lush and creative, the women all sharp, angular shoulders and heavily detailed dress, the fellas all whirring, confused and excited motion, fevered and flushed. All players in a Kresse panel are happy to be alive and participating in this retro-human game. Fingers and heels like spikes on the dames, gunboats as wide as shoeboxes on the guys. Several things distinguish a Kresse cartoon from the 1950s...One, he always took time to put glass over the modern art on the wall (as if he aspired to the same treatment, which he now deserves) and the large, undulating ribbons of bold black ink which surround his characters in elegant swerves. Surprisingly, his work has not been anthologized much that I can tell. Bill Kresse published a book way back entitled "An Introduction to Cartooning" with the subtitle "It's a Magic World" and in his case, it must have been. Although drawn and sold to over the counter girly cartoon pulp digests, these figures are always clothed (in dresses Lady Gaga could only imagine, if that) and although emotions are at a peak, for the guys anyway, the gags are always harmless, human and honest. Great work from a great artist. Kresse went on to do panel work for New York Daily Papers and had a series for which he became well-known, "Super Duper" and even worked with Terrytoons. An under appreciated master who created work which looks better today than it did 50 years ago. When he saw this tribute in his retirement, he sent me package of drawings and articles before passing away in 2014. by Jim Linderman / Dull Tool Dim Bulb A nice note from Devlin Thompson adds the following : Kresse also did work in ARCHIE'S MADHOUSE in the mid-'60s, which stuck out like a sore thumb stylistically. I never learned his name until reading an article about his newspaper work in an issue of HOGAN'S ALLEY. #cartoonist. #cartoons.

Gary Panter drawing for Vintage Sleaze the Blog (on hiatus) Collection Jim Linderman

I hope everyone has seem the documentary on Pee Wee Herman now streaming. It’s great. Gary Panter, the artist who drew this little tribute to my blog Vintage Sleaze (on hiatus for NINE YEARS now) won two daytime Emmys for his work on the Pee Wee Herman show as a designer, but I suspect he had FAR more to do with the show than just design. I met him twice, once while doing a TV profile on the artists from RAW magazine (a visual delight with a list of contributors hard to believe) and again while attending a small show in a Williamsburg NY gallery show in which he created shadows he threw up on a wall. I also lived three blocks from a Pee Wee Herman installation he created in a room in the Paramount Hotel back near Times Square back In the 80s. It’s been featured on the much lamented lost blog Lost New York. I used to sneak my dates in there. Anyway, Mr. Panter is something of a hero of mine. I don’t trust AI censorship, so I took out the nicest part of the drawing. “Vintage Slease” Original Drawing by Gary Panter 2011 Collection Jim Linderman

Vixen Books of the 1950s. Vintage Sleaze from Greenwich Village and Gil Fox. (en excerpt from Times Square Smut by Jim Linderman)

Vixen Press founder Gilbert (Gil) Fox was a Greenwich Village denizen. Mr. Fox had quite a circle of friends. Perhaps no one has paid attention to the Vixen books because they are hardbacks, and the only hardcovers here. Most of the vintage sleaze action is in lurid paperbacks, but this line of spicy stories certainly qualify.Though hardcovers, they are still cheap,tawdry and one hundred percent grade-A certified sleaze. They are also (when and if you can find them) quite affordable since no one cares. Al are now nearly 60 years old, and even harder to find in their book jackets. Gil Fox was one of the most prolific of sleaze writers. From his early books around 1950 to a massive output of Midwood books in the 1960s. He had pseudonyms such as Kim Savage, Peter Willow, Leda Starr, Kimberly Kemp, Dallas Mayo, Paul Russo, Violet Loring and more. Paperback book scholar Lynn Monroe interviewed Gil once, and I hope there are more chats coming. He certainly has stories to share. The interview is essential for any scholar interested in popular culture of the 1950s. Fox was born in 1917, served in the Air Force during the WW2 and married a female swinger whose swing went both ways. Next thing you know, he is living in Greenwich Village and itis 1950. At some point Gil met John Willie (real name was John Alexander Scott Coutts) who published the Bizarre series digests. Willie had his drawings published by Robert Harrison and is even rumored to have been responsible for asking Bettie Page to pose in bondage get-ups. Apocryphal tale, I think. Not long after meeting Willie, Gil Fox began writing his own books for Woodford Press. Fox also wrote for Stanley Malkan. Some time around 1953, Gil set up Vixen Press at 125 Christopher Street in New York City. 125 Christopher Street was also the location of the Alfred Hitchcock's film Rear Window(!) At least before they changed the address to 125 West the Street in the movie. There is an understanding in the film business that murder films use phony addresses for the same reason every big screen telephone number starts with 555.There is no 125 West 9th Street, but Gil's place still sits at 125 Christopher. Today apartments in the building rent for several thousand dollars a month and it remains a pre-war 6-story residential building. You can find real-estate listings online if you would like to relive the glory days of Greenwich Village... but it looks to me like they re-did the floors and I don't see any of Gil's ink stains.It is,however, nice to think of Gil typing while peering into same courtyard as James Stewart and Grace Kelly. Vixen Books was an apartment operation and an outlet for writers other than Gil. Barry Devlin, one of the most prolific Vixen writers, was selling work which was published as Beacon paperbacks at the same time. Another was the mysterious Justin Kent, the pseudonym of a writer who testified against mobster Edward Mishkin in an obscenity case. They apparently put out a book a month. They were likely distributed in the Times Square bookshops, but they were also distributed by Associated Booksellers in Westport, CT. and at least one other outside of the Tri- state area. Several of the copies here have stickers from "Capitol Book Store" in Indiana, so they got out to the Midwest too. No wonder New York City has a bad reputation. The cover price was $2.50. Each title, regardless of who receives credit for writing, has a hoity-toity quote from Shakespeare or an ancient learned philosopher following the title page, and each is dedicated to a dame or a couple. Hmmm. As you would imagine from the titles and covers, the Vixen line was not noted for fine literature. All the books were written as soft-core pornography. Limp-core. The characters drank and had torrid sexual adventures, even if they acted like soap opera scripts of the day. Remember, these were written in the early 1950s. Some have girl on girl action at a time it was most taboo. Plenty of lingerie too, and being taken off slowly. Some of the original Vixen titles were subsequently published as paperbacks with new titles. Moon-kissed by Barry Devlin came out under the title Forbidden Pleasures as a Berkley book. Kim Savage also had a paperback titled Helen's House published by Beacon. Mark Tryon's The Fire That Burns came out as a paperback with the byline "Girls who pose for anything" on the cover. It is more than possible others were republished in paper with entirely new titles and authors credited. For that matter, and for all I know, AL of them were written by Fox, but in particular I have seen a reference somewhere that Kim Savage was Gil Fox, though I am not sure. File under speculation. In the notes to Girls Lie Back Everywhere: The Law of Obscenity and the Assault on Genius by Edward de Grazia (1972) one Vixen book (Sweeter Than Life by Mark Tryon) was called "the forerunner of the sex pulp novels so numerous in the sixties; It contained a prominent lesbian theme and it seems to have had no appreciable literary value. (The book) is described in some detail in Felice Flannery Lewis, Literature, Obscenity and Law (1976) 180-181." Fair enough. There WAS an obscenity case brought against Gil Fox...U.S vs. Gilbert Fox, Vixen Press et al, involving four of the titles. I am not sure the outcome, nor do I know if Mr. Fox spent any time in pokey. I certainly hope not. The list of Vixen books following is the first one compiled as far as I know. The sleeve they came wrapped in is worth as much as the book. Which reminds me..the jacket illustrations are credited to NJD, de Persis, Patrika, Don Rico, who follows, and sometimes nobody. (An excerpt from the book TIMES SQUARE SMUT by Jim Linderman available from Blurb.com Helena's House Kim Savage 1960 Madame Big Barry Devlin 1953 Chains of Silk Barry Devlin 1954 Golf Widow ? 1953 Boss Lady Rick Lucas 1954 No Holds Barred Barry Devlin Carnal Cargo Barry Devlin 1952 Baby Makes Three Kim Savage (Gil Fox?) 1953 Desolate Sands Michael Norday 1955 The Sinning Lens Mark Tryon 1953 Joanne Scott Stone 1955 Mask of Night Michael Norday 1954 Dreamboat Rick Lucas 1955 Lazylegs Kim Savage 1953 Gold-plated Sin Barry Devlin 1953 Fire and Ice Barry Devlin 1952 Complex Mother Rick Lucas 1955 Take tI Off! Mark Tryon 1953 Fast Curve Justin Kent 1953 Bent to Evil Kim Savage 1952 Weekend Kim Savage 1952 Rogues and Riches Rick Lucas 1954 Blaze Scott Stone 1954 Sweet and Twenty Don Morro 1955 The Fire that Burns Mark Tryon 1954 Devil's Web Scott Stone 1955 Other Loves Barry Devlin 1955 Countess Margo Scott Stone 1955 This Paris Barry Devlin 1955 Sweeter than Life Mark Tryon Acapulco Nocturne Barry Devlin 1952 Mavis Justin Kent 1953 Dark Magic Michael Norday 1954 Strange Journey Rick Lucas 1954 On with the Dance Michael Norday 1954 Gold-plated Sin Barry Devlin 1953 Lovers and Madmen Barry Devlin 1953 Hellion Kim Savage 1951 Moon-kissed Barry Devlin 1953

Hudson Marquez Artist and Art

Hudson Marquez Artist and Art (Originally posted on the original Vintage Sleaze Blog by Jim Linderman 2013)

I believe Hudson Marquez is the first participant in the Vintage Sleaze Contemporary series to have been voted into the Broadcasting Hall of Fame, but I first knew of his work without even knowing it…through familiarity with the Cadillac Ranch and the work of the Ant Farm Collective.  Cadillac Ranch is off the scale as far as environmental art goes…one of the most famous art installations in history, and one which makes the late windbag Christo seem as profound as Leroy Neiman.  There are plenty of contemporary artists making large scale environmental sculpture and installations, but the Cadillac Ranch is the effing mother tailfin of them all.

Which is why we are thrilled not only to have Mr. Marquez as a fan of Vintage Sleaze, but now a willing participant in the series.  As is the case of most notables, Hudson is modest and self-effacing.   Following is his entire autobiography, dutifully pecked into his cellphone especially for us on request.

 "Hudson Marquez Was born in New Orleans Louisiana. He got out as soon as possible.  His travels finally led him to San Francisco where he helped found the Ant Farm, and arts collective that was very active in the late 60s early 70s. He became addicted to video and in 1972 Started the video group TVTV. This group of small format video pioneers had a great run, Producing a number of award winning documentaries for PBS. In 74 he created the Cadillac Ranch sculpture in Amarillo, Texas. Now living in Los Angeles, ex- pornographer Marquez splits his time between writing and painting pictures of cars and girls."
 
Well, with all respect, we can do better than that.

Marquez has been a provocateur his entire life.  A story teller as much as a person who lived to tell the tales… and considerable tales there are.  Like being with Led Zeppelin tales.  Like meeting Charlie Manson tales.  Like Canned Heat (look them up. listen and learn kids) tales and, well…pussy tails.  Hudson likes women and it shows.  He also once said all women should drive in high heels, a quote not only tailor made for this site, but one which could be pondered and debated in many circles.

Anyone who makes it through the decades as active, as political, as involved and as talented as Mr. Marquez deserves kudos.  That he has survived it with a glorious sense of humor and irony is admirable.  Trust it was not easy for smart people to live through the 1960s and 1970s.  Hudson is cracker-smack smart and he survived it.

A mere dip into the world of Hudson Marquez is to have the major cultural high and low points of several decades circle you like a tornado.

Mr. Marquez has work showing now at the La Luz de Jesus gallery in Los Angeles. 

Hudson's work is Acrylic and Ink on canvas now.  Big ones. With big roots from New Orleans.  Hudson is one of the few folks around who can put Professor Longhair across the table from Jayne Mansfield and make it work.  Hudson knows without Ike Turner, Tina would still be Anna Mae Bullock from Nutbush, Tennessee and if he were looking over my shoulder as I write,  I would proudly tell him I saw Ike and Tina from the first row in a gymnasium in 1971 blowing smoke right up the Ikettes skirts the entire show.  In fact, I love Hudson so much, I am putting a teeny cribbed photo of my vantage just for him.  It has absolutely nothing to do with the post here OR Hudson, but I think he'll like it.

Although above, Hudson says he was glad to get out of New Orleans, it stayed with him.  There is nothing more valuable for a contemporary artist to have in his blood than some New Orleans, and the ghosts of the city meet an amazing crew of icons in his paintings.

A fabulous, essential, hilarious interview with Hudson Marquez is HERE


Essential reading on Cadilac Ranch is HERE

Popular Culture Perceptions of the ARTIST Studio tour of Vintage Sleaze Paperbacks with Depictions of an Artist

Over the years while collecting obscure Vintage Sleaze paperbacks for a project, I accumulated a whole pallette of cruddy books based on the public perception of the passionate pleasures available to painters. Here are a few from the 1950s and 1960s...Share them all with your artist friends! See available books and affordable ebooks by Jim Linderman on BLURB.COM

Artists and their Models. Painters paint Vintage Sleaze Paperbacks

Representations of painters on paperbacks from the 1950s and 1960s. The most recognized artist in America was Norman Rockwell at the time.  These ain't him.

Here Comes TOKEY WEDGE !!! The Diminutive Hard-boiled Dick from Novel Books (Chicago) Vintage Sleaze Paperbacks

Here comes Tokey, buzzing out of the pages of pulp history from the back cover of TORRID TWINS, just one of the capers solved with his tiny fists and subtly implied detective dong  pounding. Tokey's secret weapon other than his quick wit was his manhood.  You want sex and hardboiled action in your reading?  Put down that limp "best reading" from the New York Times Book Review and grab yourself a big deep toke...of TOKEY!

A man's man and a women's dream, Tokey raced around the twirling paperback racks when the top presidential philanderer of all time, Jack Kennedy was in the White House.  Did Jack care if his "arranged" girlfriend Judith Exner was usually in bed with mobster Sam Giancana and reported back to the wise guy after every presidential performance?  HELL NO! Because Jack was a MAN'S man, just like Tokey Wedge.  Screw that, and screw THAT, organized crime.  No wonder (and no coincidence) Tokey gets involved with some  anti-Castro gun runners in BROAD BAIT...just like big Sam!   

So Tokey had a buzzcutt instead of Kennedy's Nantucket tousle...when you are racing to action in your midget muscle-car, there is no time to brush anything out of your eyes.  Here comes Tokey, nostrils flared...nay SMOKING.  Never mind that Tokey was actually no taller than 5' 4"...he was big where it mattered.  One book adds an inch to his frame...but does not specify if he had bought some lifts.

Jack Lynn wrote the Tokey Wedge novels.  Who was Jack Lynn?  WHO CARES!  This isn't about some fussy, anonymous, elite font prissy with an underwood, it's about Tokey Wedge.  The paperback community speculates who Jack was and you are more then welcome to browse around to speculate while REAL men just read the novels (from Novel Press) a sleazy Chicago outfit with questionable organized crime ties but outstandingly bad fiction! 

There were at least twenty one books by Jack and all of them had a serious problem with inaccurate perspective and unrealistic rendering on the covers.  So the real question is not who wrote this stuff, but who the hell did the art?  Check out the Torrid Twins Tokey is running down.  Not only are they twins, their burning breasts have exactly the same flame pattern!  Tokey had a thing for twins...witness Mary and Beth in another split zygote thriller "Double Seduction" which is no problem for Tokey.  He loves them and leaves them...looking exactly the same.  And yet AGAIN...there are twins in the later Desire in Duplicate...in which a $5000 a night hooker charges that much because she is...a twin! So the price is really $2500 each.  Does Tokey get a discount?  You have to ASK?

Other Jack Lynn books are listed below, but not all feature the diminutive dick Tokey.  In fact, one of them introduces a far taller character, a Danny Thomas look-a-like who actually towers over the dames who moan his name!

Tokey Wedge fears nothing as he solves the case of Nympho Lodge.  In another, Tokey struggles with a trio of "women loving women"  In Wild Women.  AS you can see, another cover with burning dames for Tokey to struggle through. 

Clearly Tokey's biggest challenge was Ten Shockingest (sic) Seductions, in which he has do do just that...seduce them all to determine which were guilty of murder and which were guilty of lesbianism.  There is only one man for the job...look down.

It's TOKEY.