Upped-skirts, Downed Panties and Other Pinup Clichés

There's a very amusing post at Illustration Art on the physics of pinup illustration. Unfortunately it made light of a subject worthy of more gravitas. So today debuts the first in a series of occasional lectures on the topic of pinup clichés. We must begin by acknowledging that a pinup is de natura iure itself a cliché, and so our endeavour will focus on the various subspecies made so popular by the leading pinup practitioners. Among them a special shout out (shout at?) must go to Art Frahm. He was the first to document the weird phenomenon of the opposing forces of updraft and gravity well, originating approximately at the girl's kneecaps with the result of a simultaneous upskirt and panty drop. In most cases Frahm embellishes the composition by the addition of the so-called lucky leerer and inexplicably celery, as first observed by the pop-culture commentator James Lileks. On our right we feature a rare example of a Frahm front flank updraft, which seems to have aroused as much enthusiasm (at least in the postman whose appointed rounds have come to a screeching halt) as would be expected from the more common rear orientation. The final element is the orientation of girl's face. For the sake of the composition but forsaking logic, her embarrassment is directed to the viewers of the painting rather than the lucky leerer, despite the fact that we are out of the site-line of the naughty bits.

Gil Elvgren is another of the upskirt devotees and he painted several examples early in his career, which began in the late 1930s. Clearly seen in these examples is his singular contribution to the genre; namely the pursed lips variation to the more general expression of abashment endemic to the pinup world. Elvgren used this expression only occasionally in his earliest work but by the 1970s (see example on right), the "Limpet"--as some disparagingly refer to it--became the standard of the Elvgren girl. Judge for yourself whether the term is apt.

The previous setups are variations on the more generic Klutz as depicted here by K.O. Munson. In most examples the girl is shown suffering from a moment of athletic ineptitude but other examples entirely forgo the pretense of a setup. We are led to belief the girl simply lacks the basic motor skills required for bipedalism.
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So where does Enoch Bolles fit in this discussion. It must be acknowledged that Bolles resorted to, if not created, many of the standard setups including the upskirt, the snagged skirt, the klutz, the girl astride beach toy, the girl with terrier, dressed in a tea towel, sleepy time girl, hairpin pose as well as many others. Yet there is a telling difference to the Bolles girl and that is her remarkable lack of self-consciousness. Caught in a situation that would shame others, she registers no embarrassment at all. Take a look at these examples and you'll see her unique temperament. True, our Spicy Stories girl may simply be unaware of her condition but you can't say the same for the girl on the cover of this 1937 issue of Film Fun. Miss Bo Peep blithely deals with her prediciment where the Driben girl registers obvious annoyance.

The final two covers are even more emblematic of the Bolles difference. Here we see standard setups for the upskirt and klutz. Most pinup girls would have been mortified but the Bolles girls are having a good time, and I hope you have too. Class dismissed.