Quiet Night In

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Etienne's Fishermen - 3

Etienne - Fisherman's Prize Catch

In this image by Etienne, the clumsy amateur angler of Part 1 and the admiring bystander in Part 2 are replaced by a man in a (wet?) pouch explicitly portrayed as 'The Catch'. He's hung up to await his fate, like the fishes in the background. Except that they are tiddlers and he certainly isn't!  The hooks that caught them lie on the ground.

It's normally angling practice to weigh prize specimens, to make a photographic record of  them and then throw them back into the water. That seems to be the procedure being followed here, but one can't help thinking that this big fish is in danger of being stuffed and mounted or even being eaten before the day is out, figuratively speaking of course.

 This comic image is one of Etienne's great might-have-beens in technical terms. The faces and physiques of the two men are beautifully drawn (particularly the catch) and the subject matter makes a fascinating bridge between the predatory nature of angling with it's dangerous impedimenta of hooks and knives and the world of captivity and domination that is S&M. Unfortunately all the beautiful detailing of this idea has been undermined by miscalculations, crazy perspectives and imbalances. These flaws which suggest to me that the artist got too involved with the eroticism of his subject and was distracted from the basics until it was too late.

Felix Falkon - Fisherman's Scuba Diver Catch

Felix Falkon was a contemporary of Etienne and once criticised him (in a friendly way) as 'lazy' but he imitated his style and recast a number of his compositions in a 'corrected' form. This may be an example of that. The two figures here do indeed look more 'correct' and yet it's not as sexy, despite the explicit details. 

The line drawing technique itself is intrinsically less sensual. There may be a colourised version of this image but Falkon lacked Etienne's mastery of shading technique, which was the equal of Tom of Finland's style. In Falkon's composition, the direct physical connection between the two figures has been sacrificed in favour of a more realistic suspension arrangement and there's less sense of lurking lust between them. Indeed the added scuba detail obscures some of the attractions of the catch. Etienne, the master of feet depiction, would probably mock Falkon's flippers as a cover-up job. Replacing the waders with boots makes a stronger S&M connection but loses an important element of the fishing theme. 

Etienne - Suspended in Jock

Compare Falkon's effort with Etienne's original suspension image and you understand the gulf in talent between them. It encompasses not only shading technique but more subtle elements like the cast of the two men's faces which successfully connects them in this version to establish a genuine sense of domination and mentoring even. Etienne's men both have a masculinity that is pretty much erased in Falkon's copied version.

Interestingly the sub's face here bears a resemblance to the that of the amateur angler pinned to a tree in Part 1 of this series, although his mentor is not the same. Etienne 'recycled' elements of his imagery sometimes and it's possible that an angling variant of this picture formed part of that set and led more directly to Falkon's imitation.

Read this series from Part 1

See the list of works by Etienne posted at mitchmen

Etienne's Fishermen - 2

Etienne - Lobster Fishing

This image by Etienne seems innocuous at first sight, almost a pastoral study of a working fisherman. That's partly because the two men in it seem posed and not interacting in any way. There's certainly not the passion seen in the first of this fishing series. 

One's eye is naturally drawn to the bare top of the hunky, lobster fisherman. Some perhaps are attracted to the strikingly dressed, young bystander. Then the erotic details click in - the fisherman is totally naked (bar his cap and waders) and the on-looker is sporting an impressive bulge in his pants (understandably).

That bulge seems to have caught the fisherman's eye too, he stops his work and leans back on one elbow, but it's almost as if he's irritated by this young sprog staring at him. He still holds the lobster over his crotch in a grip that reflects it's phallic shape. I suppose the word lobster itself has a certain innuendo value too, but it's  hard, cold shell isn't a natural choice for frottage. 

I'm no expert but I assume he's taking the tails off the lobsters, rather than selling them whole. I imagine it's not usual for a lobster fisherman to carry out this task naked at the waist, so he must get a steady flow of gawpers. If the creatures are still alive he's risking quite a lot! 

The knife in his other hand seems menacing, particularly with the youngster's bulge in his direct line of sight. The upward curve of the blade might also simply be an indicator of sexual interest but there's an unmistakeable edge to this picture. As Etienne says in Part 1, fishing (of any sort) is a dangerous sport.

Tom of Finland - Fish Surprise (1959)

Tom of Finland drew on the more obvious eroticism of a cold, wriggling fish in the lap for this playful image. It's a natural match to the drooping fish tail Etienne used in the first angling image of Part 1. 

The depiction of the scuba diver's swimming trunks in this picture has always seemed extraordinarily sexy to me, how could any man fall asleep in it's presence? The slightly phallic bottle underneath the hammock (complete with it's straw for sucking) lies in reach of the dangling hand and may be indicative of an erotic dream that is about to be abruptly ended, or perhaps one about to take place!

This modern Yaoi artist is less subtle about the phallic qualities of fish 

and leaves no doubt it's still alive. Strictly for fantasy chaps!

Correctness aside, there's some nice bondage detail in this image

More Etienne in Part 3

Mitchell's Fisherman

Mitchell - Fishermen's Tale

 

The mitchmen take on angling hooks has many elements in common with Etienne and Tom's but I can't remember if I was aware of those images when I drew it. It was largely inspired by the pose of the subject which is more overtly homoerotic than the 1950/60's artists. It's based if I remember correctly on imagery from 'Inside The Big Apple' publication or around that 80's era of Phil Flasche etc. 

There's a humiliation ingredient shared with Etienne's take but a different pun in the title I gave it, which indicates a slightly different, more melancholy strand of thought along the lines of 'the one that got away' - or the one didn't even exist in the first place!

For more art by Mitchell at mitchmen click on the mitchpix label below 

or visit the mitchmen club archive at Adonis Male

I previously published this image in 2007 but this is a new, better copy if you are a collector.

Etienne's Fishermen - 1

Etienne - Fishing Is A Dangerous Sport - 2

 

Etienne's dramatic confrontation between two fishermen is one of his most forceful and technically convincing images, but it's rarely seen. 

There's a subtle contrast between the comprehensively equipped 'pro' fisherman on the right  and the intimidated amateur angler on the left whose incompetence has caused the conflict (see next picture below). The first has quite a military look about him but the other is portrayed as a bumpkin, admittedly with stylish hair, but inappropriately dressed in trainers and skimpy cut-offs held up by a knotted rope. 

He seems highly vulnerable as his T-shirt is pulled upwards and in danger of being ripped off altogether. The drooping waders provide a corresponding hint of undress in the aggressor party. Both men sport interesting bulges, but any more suggestive erotic flavouring is limited to a fish tail* dangling from the basket just above the offender's crotch and a solitary bulrush amongst the reeds groping up his legs. We might add perhaps the handle of the fisherman's 'rod' at a stretch. 

(Those reeds look as though they might have been a late addition to disguise an unsuccessful foot).

*Tom of Finland also employed the niche eroticism of fish in a less serious encounter (see Part 2).

Etienne - Fishing Is A Dangerous Sport - 1

This picture is from the same series and shows the cause of the fisherman's anger,
the bumpkin's wild line-casting has hooked his pants and torn them wide open. 

Both these images were published in Mars magazine No 12 (1965),
apparently there are 4 more in the storyette but I don't think I've ever seen them.
The rope 'belt' in the first picture seems ripe for exploitation later on!

One month on, I stumbled across the full version of the picture above including a nice view of the clumsy young fisherman, even this version still looks cropped!

Etienne tended to portray men with cute, diminutive bottoms but the cautious portrayal here probably also owes something to the uncertainty around censorship of sexual imagery in this period when controls were being challenged.

Tom of Finland - Two Fishes (1956)

Tom of Finland can lay claim to having spotted the erotic potential of flying fish-hooks first in this 1956 image. The back-to-back, over-the-shoulder looks here don't exactly reek of sexual excitement but the fish lying on the ground do seem to allude to a hoped-for conjunction of men's parts (big and little!). The picture does look oddly cropped, so a more indicative bulge may lie just out of sight! 

1956 was not a good time for provocative gay pictures.

MacLane - Surfer Hooked

This picture by Bill MacLane must date from around the same time as Tom's. It dodges round the eroticism of the ripped swimming trunks by introducing a melodramatic menace. There's an interesting thought process going on, here relating sexuality to danger. and threat. It's similar to the moment when Freddie Kruger decides to chop up a pair of teenagers steaming up a car. 

~

There's also a mitchmen version of this scenario by Mitchell (next post)

More Etienne and Tom in Part 2

Classic Homoerotic Images - 3, When Freedom Dawned

Ralph Kleiner (Muscleboy Magazine, 1966)

The kitsch artistry and baggy pouch which Ralph Kleiner was subjected to on the front of Muscleboy in 1996 seems to epitomise the desperate concealment needed for gay magazines to get onto newsagent's shelves back then. However this image does show a romantic side to the male personality, feminine if you like, which wasn't exactly a commonplace statement in the time when men were still men. 

On top of that, he's nearly naked (implying sex is in the air) and the object of his rapt attention is a freak flower, a blue (for a boy) rose. You sense he's going to kiss it - or even eat it, God forbid! The fake nature all around him and the blue sky just over the horizon seems to invoke the sense of an optimistic, fantastical journey, just like Dorothy's in The Wizard of Oz. 

In it's way it's a very clever, political statement, deserving of it's place in my series of classic, homoerotic images. (click on the label below for others)

Glenn Bishop (Vagabond Magazine, 1966)

Compare that Muscleboy image with this openly erotic display of Glenn Bishop showing pubic hair on the Front Cover, no less, of Vagabond magazine in the same year, 1966. Admittedly, this was the era when liberation from censorship began, but I didn't think it had got quite as far as this! Glenn Bishop was arguably a gay hero, the handsome embodiment of 1950's coy, physique pouch imagery, so the sight of this must have been electric back then, a shock, almost unwelcome, as though someone like Ed Sheeran had suddenly revealed all today to demonstrate that he's just a man after all.

I think freedom came more quickly in the US than the UK and it's possible that the Vagabond issue illustrated above was for postal distribution rather than book shops. In fact I've never heard of Vagabond magazine before so maybe it never made it in into the quivering hands of sex-starved, 1966 gays at all! Not in the UK anyway.

Vagabond Magazine No 7 carried ads for gay singles

Vagabond Magazine also has an interesting link to what might be the first 'openly' gay record album, 'Love is a Drag', issued by Lace records in 1962, which featured a (straight) man singing standards, but re-gendered to be about loving other men. Vagabond No 7 in 1965 carried ads for gay singles from a different label 'Camp', including 'I'd Rather Fight Than Swish', 'Rough Trade' and 'The Ballad of the Camping Woodcutter'. The whole story is told in Subversive Sounds.

The cover of No 7 (above) featured 'respectable', men's, fashion graphics, but they are arranged in such a way as to be looking at each other, the back cover man invisibly reaching out towards another's ass while an onlooker fiddles in his pockets. Such was the meagre, but subtly exciting, fare for gays back then. Little did they know that Glenn Bishop's pubes were about to be thrust in their faces!

The cover for Vagabond No8 openly ditches the ambiguity that men's magazines are about muscle development and physique (an idea that persists in the Muscleboy, Ralph Kleiner image above). Instead it depicts a fairly ordinary young man looking up hopefully in another naturalistic setting, an image which clearly is about him as a person, not his gym programme. 

 So Vagabond too has a honourable place in gay history.

My Fetish Tea Party

The Terror of the Tongs!

For other captions at mitchmen, click on the mitchmods label below