This past spring, I was fortunate to come across the work of artist Paul Richmond. In my first piece on his work, Unspeakable Words, I focused mostly on Paul's book illustrations after discovering his artwork for the novel Shy. When working on that piece, I saved the image below, Catch Of The Day, Paul's newest painting which is available on his site HERE:
Catch Of The Day
Beach Bum by Paul Richmond
Given one of the inspiration's for Paul's work is classic cheese cake pin-up images, it makes sense that the beach makes a few appearances within his his art. One of my favorites, is Beach Bum inspired by the vintage Coppertone girl from their famous print ads and television commercials.
The 'Coppertone' pose has been the inspiration for many artists over the past few years including photographer Annie leibovitz who used the shot as inspiration for her 1993 shoot with actor Mark Wahlberg.
For his vision, Paul approached writer and photographer Alan Ilagan to take on the cheesecake boy role in the piece. Instead of a cute little cocker spaniel, Paul thought it would cuter if the tugger was not a dog, bu a second speedo-clad hunk!
'Without a secondary model to execute the pose, Alan devised a brilliant way of achieving the same effect for the photo reference. I love the effort he put into making sure the tugging of the speedo was just right! Meanwhile, that hook contraption might come in handy down the road!'
'Thankfully Alan is no stranger to disrobing on cue. I knew he would be the perfect subject for a summertime pin-up scenario, and when I contacted him to propose the idea, he was happy to drop trou for the sake of art. It’s not the first time he’s been an artistic muse either. Just yesterday I learned that Michael Breyette has also done a portrait of him -- a gorgeous, speedo-lover’s delight called Alan in Blue. After sharing my concept with Alan and sending him some examples of what I was looking for, I was thrilled to receive a number of fantastic photo references from him. The brilliance with which he staged the wardrobe malfunction will be shared in a future post.'
Paul Richmond
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