Gil Elvgren (1914-1980)

Gil Elvgren has joined the ranks of George Petty and Alberto Vargas as one of the premiere American pin-up artists...the Norman Rockwell of cheese-cake. His heroines are often caught in humorous but distressing situations. His exquisite oils of gorgeous girls-next door their skirts often blowing up to reveal lovely nylon-clad limbs rival his mentor Haddon Sundblom's "Coca-Cola" Santas for sheer nostalgic pleasure. Born in St. Paul, Minnesota, Gillette A. Elvgren attended University High School. After graduation he began studying art at the Minneapolis Art Institute.

Gil Elvgren.

Some of Gil's fellow students were Coby Whitmore, Al Buell, Andrew Loomis, Ben Stahl and Robert Skemp (many of whom would later work for Coca Cola) as would Elvgren. He graduated from the Academy during the depression at the age of twenty-two. Gil joined the stable of artists at Stevens and Gross, Chicago's most prestigious advertising agency. He became a protégé of the monumentally talented Haddon Sundblom, who was most famous for his Coca Cola Santas. Working in Sundblom's shop (Stevens-Gross) with Al Buell and Andrew Loomis (among other noted illustrators), Elvgren contributed to various Coca-Cola ads himself. Sundblom who had studied at the American Academy of Fine Art taught his star pupil the lush brush stroke technique that makes Elvgren's girls such glowing wonders.

Elvgren looked for models with vitality and personality, and chose young girls who were new to the modelling business. He felt the ideal pin-up was a fifteen-year-old face on a twenty-year-old body, so he combined the two. An Elvgren model was never portrayed as a femme fatale. She is, rather, the girl next door whose charms are revealed in that fleeting instant when she's been caught unaware in what might be an embarrassing situation. Gusting winds and playful plants grab at her lovely, long legs. She is intruded upon as she takes a bath. Her skirts get caught in elevator doors, hung up on taps, and entangled with dog leashes. The elements conspire in divesting her of her clothing. His 30" x 24" oils on stretched canvas are second in value only to originals by Vargas.

Major Publishers

1937 to 1944 - Louis F. Dow & Co
In 1937, Gil began painting calendar pin-ups for Louis F. Dow, one of America's leading publishing companies, during which time he created about 60 works. These pin ups are easily recognizable because they are signed with a printed version of Elvgren's name, as opposed to his later cursive signature. Dow paintings were often published first in one format, then painted over with different clothes and situations. These 'new' paintings were then republished and distributed to an unsuspecting public.

1945 to 1972 - Brown & Bigelow
Around 1944, Gil was approached by Brown and Bigelow, a firm that still dominates the field in producing calendars and advertising specialties. They offered him $1000 per pin-up, which was substantially more than Dow was paying him. Elvgren signed on with Brown & Bigelow. Gil's Brown and Bigelow images all contain his cursive signature. By the terms of Elvgren's contract with Brown & Bigelow, he would turn out twenty calendar girls each year, ranging from cowgirls of the golden west to sultry sirens of the Riviera.