12 October 2013

Art of George Petty


George Brown Petty IV was an American  artist who's pin-up art appeared primarily in Esquire but was also in calendars marketed by Esquire, True and Ridgid Tool Company. 
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 He was born in  rural  Louisiana in 1894. Petty is especially known for “the Petty Girl”, a series of pin-up paintings of women done for Esquire from the autumn of 1933 until 1956. Petty frequently depicted these women with the relative lengths of their legs being longer—and the relative sizes of their heads being smaller—than those of his actual models. He invented the Barbie Look.



The famous nose art on the B-17 bomber MEMPHIS BELLE was a copy of one of his works.































Robert Cummings portrayed George Petty in the imaginary musical comedy The Petty Girl (Columbia, 1950), directed by Henry Levin and featuring the film debut of Tippi Hedren as one of the Petty Girls.

Petty died in San Pedro, California, on July 21, 1975







1929 ad

Esquire, 1934




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