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Posted 12 months ago
Alfredo
(362 items)
First, some important background information culled from Internet:
Interwoven Mills was the largest employer in Martinsburg for several decades. It had its start in 1890–91. By the end of 1906, the company had 2,000 domestic accounts which included some of the country’s largest retail businesses, and was shipping goods overseas; salesmen also sold Interwoven products door-to-door.
By 1921, Interwoven had opened branch plants in Hagerstown, Maryland; Chambersburg, Pennsylvania; and Berkeley Springs.
Interwoven prospered until the 1929 stock market crash and ensuing Depression. Interwoven workers took part in the Textile Workers of America’s nationwide strike in 1934. Approximately 80 percent of the employees walked out, forcing the company to operate with a skeleton crew.
During World War II, Interwoven manufactured socks for army and navy personnel. Ownership changed in 1962. Interwoven decided to move most of its operation to North Carolina, and Kayser-Roth, Inc., purchased the Martinsburg operation. Kayser-Roth closed the Martinsburg complex in February 1976, bringing an important chapter in the city’s industrial history to an end.
And their primary advertising illustrator was J.C. Leyendecker, who created some of the most out-of-the-closet ads to ever make it to the general public!
Pic. 1: let us start with J.C.'s iconic lover, Charles Beach, immortalized industriously reading on a window sill.
Pic. 2: A rear shot of an effete man in underwear admiring his own gams.
Pic. 3: The partially open robe/gown was a female trademark of the period. Leyendecker appropriates it. I found a blog dedicated to his Interwoven ads, stating that if you did not have a sock or a shoe fetish, by the time you finished reading the posting, you would!
Pic. 4: more of the same, but quite more daring. I cannot but contrast these with his ads featuring testosterone-rich hunks.
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the first one is definitely a maxfield parrish knock-off, but the other three definitely appeal to the 'inner drag queen'. too funny!
i take the first part of that comment back. maxfield parrish was probably copying Leyendecker, not the other way around!
The Leyendeckers' influence on the whole Age of Illustration was enormous. Once in a while I come upon an "imitator", which I promptly buy!
i grew up very close to maxfield parrish's house and we had some of his and his dad's work on our walls. friends of mine had huge - wall-size paintings of his in their homes. cornish is the only place i've seen with that beautiful blue sky seen in his paintings. i love many illustrators from that time - detmold, rackham, or maybe a little bit previous. i can't believe i never paid any attention to leyendecker before.
I'm a big Leyendecker fan too. Love his brushstrokes & avante garde style. Even his signature is cool. I do like #1 the best, I guess the self-fawning gentlemen is not my style.
The point is that he dared. He was appropriating stereotypical female poses and subverting the very image of the Leyendecker male he had created. My friends always crack up!
i think it's hilarious and very effective, considering rocky horror hadn't even been made yet!