Today we have a colour song sheet cover from 1912. Following on from yesterday’s Magnificent Men post, here we have another, in this case real period piece, featuring pre-Great War music, aircraft and art. There’s something rather appealing about the slightly naive figure drawing, and the vague aircraft shapes. But how many airshows can claim…
Category: Ephemera
Missing Fabric Man
You never know where the next one will come from*. Today it’s a recreated modern version of an historical quilt, both in an excellent little book by Bill Volckening called ‘Modern Roots – Today’s Quilts from Yesterday’s Inspiration’. Available from your quality bookseller, in our local case that would be Can Do Books, Melbourne, though…
The Lockheed Header
The current page header image is a painting of a Lockheed Model 12 Electra Junior used on a Lockheed publicity brochure, from my personal collection. James Kightly, Vintage Aero Writer.
J.C. Leyendecker Fashion Cover
Another thanks to the Today’s Inspiration Group. Here’s a rough of a pilot figure by well known commercial artist Joseph Christian Leyendecker (1874–1951) from the Great War period, before the US entry into the war, when fashion catalogues would still be around. The detail in the final image detail dates to 1917 (the…
RAF Pastiche in the Century
Most pastiche period illustrations don’t capture the correct look and feel, either trying to hard or just not understanding the aesthetic. This set of cars, seen at Metro Hobbies in Melbourne, Victoria, do manage the flight of Spitfires pretty well, though the overall image uses modern fonts. The Spitfires could be a screenprint poster from…
Multi-National Smiths
I don’t think I’ve seen a better illustration of the intent and concept of the 24 hour bomber campaign by the British, Commonwealth and Free European nations night campaign led by the Royal Air Force’s Bomber Command, and the increasingly effective day campaign of the United States Army Air Force against Nazi Germany, here from…
Littering Information
A flight information brochure, from an era when most of the few who flew, only flew a few times. The format is interesting, as it’s an eyecatching way of presenting a list. In the era, littering was not acceptable, but of course the paper trail is only artistic licence anyway. Subject Ansett Airlines Douglas DC-3…
Short Sealand
Today’s poster. A favourite type of mine, but one of those 1950s style illustrations that are so much of their time. Here, a brochure cover (I think) and while the (unknown) artist’s handled the overall design more than competently, and it’s an attractive one, his perspective on the aircraft (cockpit and tail) is a bit…
A Sawed-Up Gauntlet Set
A traditional, wooden proper ‘jig-sawed’ jigsaw puzzle, featuring a flight of RAF Gloster Gauntlet fighters. At the RAAF Museum, Cosford, taken by the author in 2008. Does anyone know the artist? The original painting is signed, but unreadable in the photograph, unfortunately. James Kightly, Vintage Aero Writer.
A Year of Aviation Illustration & Art 