untitled (gatefold), Alberto Vargas

Exhibition Label: “Conversation IV: Construction/Destruction,” Nov-2008, Bertram Lyons The watercolor and airbrushed drawings by Alberto Vargas in the Spencer’s collection were created as “process art” in order to be photographed for reproduction as calendars and gatefolds (centerfolds) in Esquire magazine. Despite the beauty of these original drawings and the care that went into their creation, this source material fulfilled its chief purpose after it was commercially reproduced in the 1940s. After 60 years, these light-sensitive watercolors have faded and their margins occasionally reveal registration marks or printer’s notations placed on the works when they were photographed for reproduction. Sometimes, their deterioration exposes Vargas’s working methods. It appears on occasion Vargas created his figures as fully-realized nudes and later clothed them with separately prepared cut-outs. In this example, the collaged clothes were attached with rubber cement which has dried, allowing the clothes to detach and leave a glue residue on the underlying watercolor. Parts of the trumpet have been permanently lost. Exhibition Label: "Alberto Vargas: The Esquire Pinups," Sep-2001, Stephen Goddard, Maria Buszek This member of the Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps holds a bugle and gives the sign of victory. The WAACs did non-combat work for the Army and numbered nearly 100,000 by the end of the war. Despite the patriotic role depicted, this is one of the images that the Postmaster General referred to in a failed attempt to revoke Esquire’s second-class mailing privilege on grounds of obscenity. The collaged clothes for this gatefold were attached with rubber cement which has dried, allowing the clothes to detach (the damaged garments are exhibited to the right) and leaving a glue residue on the underlying watercolor. Parts of the trumpet have been permanently lost as well. The image can be seen in its totality in the issue of Esquire exhibited here. The inscription seen here, “My hat’s off!” was presumably added when the image was used on another occasion, perhaps in a military issue of Esquire. The military issues are described for the March 1944 image exhibited here. (Phil Stack’s verse suggests that this WAAC is also a war bride.)