SEX SELLS
Women in Photography and Film
By Rhetta Akamatsu
Copyright 2011 by Rhetta Akamatsu
Smashwords Edition
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
Part 1:Early Photography
Naughty Pictures
The Models
The Photographers
Part 2: Stage and Screen
Gypsy Rose Lee
Sally Rand
Josephine Baker
Part 3: The Pinup Girls
Bettie Page
Lili St. Cyr
Part 4: The Screen
Part 5: The Stars
Theda Bara
Clara Bow
Jean Harlow
Marlene Dietrich
Mae West
Rita Hayworth
Marilyn Monroe
Dorothy Dandridge
Part 6: A Word or Two about Censorship
Part 7: Sex Sells Today
Bibliography
INTRODUCTION
What is one thing the print media, stage, and screen have in common?
They all have, and still do, used sexual suggestion and the nude or scantily clad female body to sell their products.
From the birth of photography, the camera and other media have been used to capture the essence of men’s sexual fantasies. Women indecently dressed have been a constant source of fascination for men from the beginning of time, as witnessed by the wall paintings of Pompeii or in the Egyptian tombs. In capturing these images in relatively modern times, many interesting techniques have been used, from the bizarre to the elegant. Many of the early portraits have a sweet kind of innocence to them, despite the fact that the photographers and the models were blatantly breaking the law. Legendary photographers created works that are now considered masterpieces of the art but which were considered scandalous in their time.
In addition, many richly bawdy and fascinating characters have been displayed on film and stage in various stages of dress or undress. This book is about those images and those characters, and the people who created them.
You will not find descriptions or depictions of the actual sexual act in this book; it is the use of the body and sexual suggestion that I am interested in documenting,
and not the necessarily straight-forward, no-nonsense reality of the act itself.
Rhetta Akamatsu
June 2011
PART I: EARLY PHOTOGRAPHY
NAUGHTY PICTURES
From the beginning of recorded history, man has been fascinated with the female body. The great art of the world is full of nude or scantily clad females, often made less sensually explicit by religious or mythical contexts. With the beginning of photography in the mid 1800's, however, these religious and mythological themes no longer came between the viewer and the blatant sensuality of the women. Sometimes the photographers used props or copied the themes of artwork, but the knowledge that the women in the picture were real and chose to pose in little or no clothing was inescapable.
Steps were taken early to try and stop the flow of "pornographic" or "erotic" pictures. It was illegal to send them in the mail, and dangerous to pose for them. Most photographers tried to get around the laws in a number of ways. They positioned the models so that some body parts were always hidden. They often chose models who had a certain androgynous quality: small breasts or rather masculine features. They never portrayed males in the pictures with the females if the women were nude, or so much as suggested any relationship with a male other than a mildly flirtatious one in which the woman was the aggressor. Except
in the separate genre of male nude photography, which I will not cover here, men were never seen nude. Scenes ranged from the ever-popular dressing room to the wildly improbable nude romp through nature and every variation in between (including a whole realm of nude sports, such as fishing or bicycling.) The absence of males in the pictures, of course, backfired as censorship usually does, only heightening the appeal to the male viewer, who was free to picture himself in the scenes in any way he chose.
Another way of attempting to make the pictures more “acceptable” was to present them in some exotic land or location, as an educational study of places where the women wore little or no clothing. The natives in many countries quickly discovered that the photographers would pay them to pose for them, and, since they had no moral restrictions to get in the way, saw no reason not to do so. Many a young man was suddenly intensely interested in magazines that centered on such “cultural” studies.
Of course, for early photos to qualify as shocking and profoundly sexual in nature, it was not at all necessary for the women to be nude, or to be displaying anything more than a great deal of arm and leg or a fair amount of bosom. There are many amusing photos from the early 1900’s in which the ladies are seen in their underwear, which covers a great deal more than many of our street clothes today. Often, the ladies are wearing a wildly improbable mix of clothing, such as lingerie and a huge hat, or a one-piece undergarment, coat, hat and cane. Apparently, in Victorian times, every woman put on her hat and boots before she put on her dress.But at a time when women were covered from neck to two, when, as Cole Porter wrote, “a glimpse of stocking/ was looked on as something shocking,” these photos were enough to send any man on a flight of erotic fantasy.
In these pictures, unlike the pictures where the women were actually nude, the indecently clad ladies were often photographed with a male figure, who was always fully and properly dressed. Sometimes they were even making definite advances to him, or they were in highly suggestive poses, to make up for the presence of clothing. No “lady” would sit like these ladies do, often with their legs up in the air over an arm of a chair, or propped on some piece of furniture. (The dressing scenes are very good for this, as the women are almost always pulling on stockings.)
An immodest picture in the dressing room style
Modest, charming but very risqué for its time
When an artist painted a nude, he often used his own mistress or lover or a prostitute as his model. Many prostitutes were prized by artists for this purpose because of their ability to hold a pose. Their occupation had taught them patience. With the advent of photography, once again, it was often the "loose women" who were the subjects for the photographs, although they were not always prostitutes. The ones who were art models were the most popular, because it took a long exposure time for the photographic plate and their experience holding a pose was a great boon.
The demand for risqué photographs developed quickly. By the 1920’s, nude and near-nude postcards had been produced in the millions. The models who were willing to appear scantily clad were often the same ones who appeared in ads in magazines for such subjects as undergarments, cigarettes, and soft drinks. The images of the ones who were willing to appear nude were everywhere, appearing again and again in photographs from many different studios, often in almost identical poses. Remember, this was a world where women who needed to make a living were confined primarily to sewing rooms, factories, or jobs such as “governess” or “companion,” which were usually little more than a step above slavery. “Old maids” often were expected to remain at home taking care of their parents for their entire lives. Alternatively, a poor woman could “make her living on her back.” Surely, it was much easier and more pleasant work simply to pose with some props for a camera. So their faces and bodies were well known, yet there were no names attached to these images. After all, they were breaking the law.
An exception is the beautiful “Fernande,” the subject of a series of photographs taken by a prolific photographer named Jean Angelou. And, even in her case, we do not know a last name or anything about her other than that she also posed for art magazines in more respectable clothing, and that she is believed by some to have been a French prostitute in the early 1900’s.
Fernande
Often, the women who appear in these photos are still written about in very derogatory ways today, and one thing that is said of them is that they were usually “drug addicts.” However, many of the pictures themselves do not seem to show evidence of this. The women tend to be cheerful looking and very healthy in appearance. There are none of the sunken cheeks, vacant stares, or extreme thinness one might expect to find in addicts. Indeed, these women look far healthier and happier than the women in the famous Storyville portraits of prostitutes, most of whom are known to have been alcoholics and addicts. Contrast this picture from Storyville with the other photos in this book:
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Storyville photo on top, typical “risqué” photo on bottom
It is more likely that if they were, indeed, prostitutes, they were of a higher class of that profession and not the common streetwalkers, and if they drank or used drugs, it was not to the point of addiction, nor, for that matter, any more often than the factory workers and hat makers of the time.
In addition to prostitutes and art models, many of these models were also performers on the stage, dancers, and members of opera companies. These occupations were already considered not much more respectable than prostitution, so they had little to lose. As mentioned earlier, a number of these models also appeared in magazines and other print media in advertisements for soap, undergarments, beer, soft drinks, and other commercial items.
Most early photographers were artists of some sort, or at least had studied art at some point. Drawing nudes from life was an accepted part of art training, and it was not a great step for these photographers to move from drawing or painting nudes to photographing them.
While, as we have noted, nude or near nude bodies have always been a popular subject of art, photography, beginning with the daguerreotype in 1839, brought an intimacy to the subject that was greater than ever before. There was the body in its natural state, only minimally altered by whatever draperies or props the photographers had chosen to use. These were obviously real people, and their expressions and poses were deliberately intended to speak directly to the viewer. Of course, there was the added thrill, for the photographer, the model, and the viewer, of breaking the law and disobeying the prevailing moral code of the time. Stolen fruit, as the proverb goes, is always the sweetest. They were living on the edge, as it were, but with little risk to life or limb. There was, however, a substantial risk to reputation, especially on the part of the viewer, and even the possibility of prison, especially for the photographer or model.
Photographers, we have seen, tried to protect themselves by ensuring that the most intimate parts of the body were not shown in their work (thus the great emphasis on breasts,) and that there was no possible hint of anything going on between the photographer and the model(s). The women were shown posing with stuffed animals or all kinds of theatrical props, or taking a bath or dressing themselves, but never with a person of the opposite sex unless they were at least partially clothed, and never with the man deliberately touching the female (although in some rare instances, the woman might be touching him, in a flirtatious but not especially sexual way). Leaving these things to the imagination naturally enhanced the appeal of the nearly always female models to the mostly male viewers.
The women who posed for these photos were automatically “loose women,” no matter what else they did or did not do in their lives, both in America and throughout Europe. Even if they weren’t actually prostitutes, they were in the eyes of society, since they were selling their bodies for erotic purposes, after all.
In the less widespread genre of nude male photography, the men suffered far less from society, as they were considered depraved, anyway, and not held to the same standards of purity that women were expected to uphold.
When we look at these pictures today, many of them still strike an erotic cord in the viewer. Others inspire only a tender or bemused sort of amusement, with their almost innocent charm. They are an enduring and fascinating testimony to the erotic side of human nature, which may be stifled but will not be denied, and a fascinating look into our recent past.
Though we know very little about most of the women in the photographs, quite a few of the photographers who chose to take these risks and create early erotic photography went on to become well-known. Following is a sampling of them and their work.
BRUNO BRAQUEHAIS
Although no one seems to know where Bruno Braquehais was born or how he spent his early life, we do know that by 1850 he was creating colored daguerreotypes, which are the earliest type of photographs, in Paris. He was mute, although we don’t know what caused that condition, but this seems to have effected his approach to his work and in particular to his models, who are very stiff and melodramatic, and often surrounded by an abundance of accessories and veils. Despite this unnatural style, the masterful way he uses the light makes his models seem not only completely unemotional but highly sensual at the same time. His style is exemplified by his stereoscopic images.
The stereoscope, which is now mostly known as a children’s toy, was a very popular source of entertainment in Victorian homes. People were fascinated by the 3D effect that could be achieved. While proper families enjoyed vicarious trips to famous landmarks around the world, the underground of erotic photography found its way to the stereoscope as well. In the hands of a talented artist such as Braquehais, the results were often amazingly beautiful as well as erotic.
The coloring of Braquehais’s daguerreotypes and stereoscopic images, in these days before color film, was quite beautifully hand-done by Miss Aleix Gouin. She had met the photographer in her father’s studio, which he shared for a time before her father’s death. Braquehais married Miss Gouin after her father died, and they continued to work in photography together and separately. They were the last to specialize in daguerreotypes in Paris. They continued their work throughout the 1860’s and 1870’s.
Because all of the photos that exemplify Braquehais’s erotic work contains nudity, it is not possible for me to include it in this book. However, many examples are aviailble in bookstores and on the Internet.
IMOGEN CUNNINGHAM
Imogen Cunningham began taking pictures in 1901, as a student at the University of Washington. She has been quoted as claiming that she “invented the nude.” That is an obvious exaggeration, but certainly she was an early pioneer as a woman photographer as well as a woman who photographed nudes, both mail and female. She saw the human body as a thing of beauty, a miracle of design. Her photos are considerably more artistic than those taken for the market for nude photography in general, and are featured in galleries today.
AUGUSTE BELLOC
Auguste Belloc was well-known in Paris for his portraiture in the 1850’s, but he specialized in nude studies as well. He loved to use props, such as chaise lounges and lots of drapery, and, like Barquehais, was also an expert at using light to enhance the sensuality of his work. His work often has familiar artistic poses and themes of the time. Painters loved his pictures, and often used them as studies for their paintings, thus sparing themselves the expense of hiring models.
Stereoscope by Belloc
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MAN RAY
While Man Ray is famous for so much more than just his nude photography, nevertheless his work deserves to be included in any list of early photographic erotica. He was also a painter and a sculptor. He was the most famous maker of photographs created without a camera, by applying images directly to photographic paper and exposing them to light. But for us, his significance lies in the wonderful nudes he did in the 20’s and 30’s, the most famous of which is the marvelous “Violin d’Ingres”:
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Simone Prieur, by Man Ray
PART II: STAGE AND SCREEN
The bawdy use of sex to sell a stage show probably got its start with “burlesque,” a form of show which began as a comic parody of high society but soon became a catch-all term for “low” comedy, with huge amounts of broad sexual innuendo par for the course.
One of the earliest acts of this type was known as Lydia Thompson’s British Blondes, who took to the stage in the 1860’s. Most of this troupe was made up of women, and they dressed in scanty costumes which revealed a great deal of scandalous leg to the audience. Very often, they played male roles that allowed them to dress in short pants and tunics, but they certainly never tried to look remotely male. Usually, the role was of an innocent whose lack of awareness of the ways of the world provided the basis for the humor. Critics were absolutely horrified as much at the swearing, striding, spitting, unfeminine behavior of these women playing men as by their clothing or lack of it.
Eventually, the burlesque show evolved into the strip tease show, which had its heyday in the 1930’s. Striptease, of course, was not a new phenomenon. Even the Bible contains the story of Salome, who danced a famous striptease for King Herod in order to get him to agree to behead John the Baptist (and inspired thousands of later striptease acts.) However, our version of striptease is usually thought to have begun in the 1890’s in Paris, with a stage act in which a woman whose name we no longer remember removed her clothes while pretending to search for a non-existent flea. From such humble beginnings, a long-lasting and profitable tradition began.
Many famous performers have fallen under the category of strippers, or “exotic dancers.” As we look at the lives of a few of them, you will note that often, the field of stage performance crossed over into the fields of print and film.
GYPSY ROSE LEE
Quite possibly the most remembered and popular stripper ever, Gypsy Rose Lee was born Rose Louise Hovick in 1914. She began her stage career at the age of 4, performing with her sister in order to support her family after her father abandoned them. Her mother, often considered the perfect example of a stage mother, used the children to make a living, but her sister was so unhappy that she eloped with a much older man at the age of thirteen to get away from her mother and show business. Rose Louise was then her mother’s sole support.
She and her mother were broke. Vaudeville was dying, being replaced with the much raunchier burlesque show. So, at the age of 16, Rose Louise Hovick changed her name to Gypsy Rose Lee and started stripping.
Unlike most strippers at the time, she was a natural performer, who talked to her audience rather than just taking off her clothes. As a result, by the 1930’s, she was a star. In 1936 she became a member of the most popular show of the time, The Ziegfeld Follies. This caught Hollywood’s attention, and Gypsy was hired by 20th Century Fox, but the timing was all wrong. The Hays Code was just beginning to be fiercely enforced, and sadly the censors wouldn't let her do what she was best known for and even went so far as to not allow her to appear using her stage name of Gypsy Rose Lee in many films.
In addition, her life offscreen was especially busy. She got married and divorced. She wrote a mystery called The G String Murders, and became quite successful as an author.
By age 28, she was married again, which did not stop her from becoming pregnant by the famous director, Otto Preminger. Gossip was cruel at the time, and even a stripper could have her career ruined by this kind of publicity, so she passed the child off as the offspring of her husband. She got divorced the day her son Eric was born. Eric grew up believing that her past husband was his father.
In 1954, Gypsy’s stage managing mother died. Although she was sad, it is alleged to have been a great relief to Gypsy as well, since she was finally out from under her mother’s influence for the first time in her life. It paved the way for her to retire from stripping in 1956 and write her autobiography, Gypsy, which became a best seller, a smash Broadway show starring Ethel Merman, and later a movie and most, recently, appeared as a new version on television.
The book and subsequent film made Lee a living legend and gave the striptease a glamour it had never had before.
Her son was now in his 20’s. He became suspicious about his parentage and pressured her until she admitted the truth. Since her career was no longer in danger, Otto reluctantly adopted him and is said to have become quite proud of his son.