Greg Hildebrandt (b.1939)

Greg Hildebrandt finally made the decision to live the dream of every commercial illustrator and do a painting just for himself and this resulted in the American Beauties series.

Greg Hildebrandt... he decided upon a combination of beautiful women and richly detailed backgrounds to help create an atmosphere and a story that are not often seen in the world of pin-up illustration.

The year was 1939. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was in the White House. Hitler was waging war on Britain and France. The country's 131 million people were lining up to see The Wizard of Oz, the Yankees won the World Series Championship, a loaf of bread cost 8 cents, and, on January 23, the Brothers Hildebrandt were born. Throughout his career, Greg would work together and separately, and together again, with his twin brother Tim. Together they would create everything from the world famous poster for Star Wars, the best-selling calendars illustrating J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, to their own fantasy novel, Urshurak. They would also work on advertising art, hundreds of classic children's books, and the covers of numerous fantasy and science fiction novels. They have won the coveted Gold Medal from the Society of Illustrators and in 1973, the Child Study Association chose their Giant Panda Book as a Children's Books of the Year. However, being a twin can be both a blessing and a curse. Being so closely related in both life and work, a sense of individuality can be lost, at least in the eyes of the public.

Finally, towards the end of 1999, with a career in commercial art and illustration spanning forty years, Greg finally made the decision to live the dream of every commercial illustrator and do a painting just for himself. After considerable thought Greg made the decision to combine the two greatest loves of his life, Art and Women. This resulted in not just one painting but an entire series of paintings - American Beauties:

"When I sat down to choose what kind of women I wanted to portray in my series I knew that I had to have 'Good Girls' and the 'Not so Good Girls'. Once I decided to place this series in the 40s and 50s, which is when I grew up, my choices for scenes came like lightning! Good girls in bad situations and bad girls in good situations."