Jack Parker, Eugenie Groh & Georgine Strathy: The Montreal Eaton's Store Powerhouse Fashion Art Team

Katherine Bosnitch must have very fond memories of March 2000. That's when her thesis was published by Concordia University in Montreal, Canada.



The topic: Eaton's Prestige Fashion Advertising Published in the Montreal Gazette, 1952-1972.



For those who don't know, The Eaton's department store chain was one of Canada's leading retailers for over a hundred years.

From the Eaton's Wikipedia page:

"The T. Eaton Co. Limited was once Canada's largest department store retailer. It was founded in 1869 in Toronto by Timothy Eaton, an Irish immigrant. Eaton's grew to become a retail and social institution in Canada, with stores across the country, buying offices across the globe, and a catalogue that was found in the homes of most Canadians. A changing economic and retail environment in the late 20th century, and mismanagement culminated in the chain's bankruptcy in 1999."



Like so many other large chains, Eaton's failed to adapt to the age of the 'big box' retailers, but for the period in question, Eaton's was where everyone in Canada shopped - and the Montreal Eaton's store was world renowned as a destination for high fashion shoppers. In her thesis, Katherine Bosnitch sets the scene for us in fascinating detail, explaining how three artists came together to create thousands of beautiful, innovative ads for three high-end ladies fashion 'boutiques' on the 3rd floor of the Montreal Eaton's store. Those three artists were Jack Parker, Eugenie Groh...



... and Georgine Strathy.



Imagine a time when three artists were employed - for decades! - to create thousands of advertising graphics for just three specific shops within a single larger store in one city, for publication in only one local newspaper. It boggles the mind.

Yet this was exactly the situation for Parker, Groh and Strathy.



And perhaps it is because of this circumstance that these three have not been recognized to a greater degree by the fashion art historians. In preparing her thesis, Bosnitch investigated many texts written by American, Australian, British, French and Japanese authors... but Canada's contribution to the world of fashion art is "absent."



What a shame... because, as Bosnitch points out, Parker, Groh and Strathy were recognized by professional organizations - both Canadian and foreign - of the communication arts, which published their work in magazines and annuals, and recognized their accomplishments with industry awards.





As Bosnitch writes in her abstract, "the prestige fashion ads which Eugenie Groh, Jack Parker, and Georgine Strathy created for the Gazette newspaper received international acclaim, both for their unusual design and their complex use of colour. Over a hundred awards and countless accolades , including mentions from Women's Wear Daily, The Art Directors Club of New York, Graphis, Communication Arts, and Idea are testimony to the extent of their impact."



Tomorrow, with the help of Katherine Bosnitch's research, we'll learn a little about these artists and their groundbreaking work.

Serendipity on a Sunny Spring Saturday

By some sort of harmonic convergence, mid-century art studios, fashion illustration, female illustrators, Canadian illustrators - even the Famous Artists Course - all came together for me over the weekend. Listen...

On Friday I told you about a Canadian illustrator, Jerry Lazare who was one of the first Canadian students of the Famous Artists School back in the late 1940s. Serendipitously, that same day (Friday) I acquired the 12th Annual of the Toronto Art Directors Club featuring the best in Canadian art and design from 1959.

The first thing that caught my eye was this striking full page ad for a Toronto art studio of that era, Sherman Laws & Partners.



The ad seems to be unsigned, but the style reminded me somewhat of a double page spread from Canadian Weekend magazine I had scanned a few years ago. This was done by an artist named Bruce Johnson in 1961.



Johnson, to the best of my knowledge, worked in Toronto, so he would have been in the right place at the right time doing a similar style. Could it be his work on the Sherman Laws ad?



Perhaps... but as I flipped through the Toronto AD Annual I kept seeing the work of a fashion illustrator named Eugenie Groh. Among the numerous pieces Groh has in this 1960 volume is the award winner for the "Fashion Illustration/Posters" category.



I don't know if Groh was the artist responsible for the Sherman Laws ad, but after seeing so many impressive examples of her work being showcased in the annual, I was curious to see if I could find out more about her ... and whattaya know... I did. A lot more.

So you're beginning to see what I mean at the top of this post about all the various topics of interest coming together for me on this one. But how does the Famous Artists Course fit into this picture?

I'll share that (and more example's of Eugenie Groh's work)... tomorrow.

FAS Alumnus, Jerry Lazare

When Famous Artists magazine began its "Spotlight on Alumni" series, Canadian illustrator Jerry Lazare was the first graduate featured.



Lazare's story is a fascinating one. During WWII, the Canadian government imposed an embargo on "non-essential mail." Falling into that category were American comic books. The sudden absence of this popular source of children's entertainment presented a unique opportunity for Canadian publishers. A few were astute enough to jump into the comic book business, but finding enough artists and writers to provide a steady source of content was a challenge.

Enter young Jerry Lazare. Still just in high school, Lazare submitted a sample story to Toronto publisher, Bell Features. It was immediately snapped up. The emboldened Lazare took this as a sign that his school days were over. At age 16 he dropped out, opened a studio and, along with a number of similarly entrepreneurial youngsters, began churning out comic pages.









But the Canadian comics phenomenon would last only as long as the war (and the embargo on the superior American comics). With the inevitable collapse of Bell Features, Lazare found himself unemployed. This situation didn't dissuade him from continuing to pursue art as a career, however... in 1945 Lazare managed to secure an apprenticeship in a Toronto commercial art studio.



Lazare recalled, "During that period, several of us from the studio - all young, would-be illustrators - met weekly to analyze the work of our favourite pro - Al Dorne. We clipped and studied every example of his work we could find."



That same year, Lazare went to New York and made arrangements to meet his idol. He said, "I'll never forget my arrival at [Dorne's] studio, clutching some horrible comic strip samples - and receiving an unbelievably warm welcome."



"While we chatted, Arthur William Brown and Ben Stahl dropped in, and I nearly flipped!"



On that day Jerry Lazare heard about Dorne's plans for the Famous Artists School from Dorne himself. When the school finally launched, he became one of its first Canadian students. Lazare's friendship continued for many years afterwards - when he had himself become a successful illustrator and would make frequent trips to New York. Those trips often included visits with his friend and mentor. Lazare said that Dorne treated him like a son.



In 1953, Jerry Lazare married and took a three month tour of Europe - visiting galleries and museums.



He then settled in London, where he worked for an art studio for the rest of the year and spent his free time painting, sketching and visiting galleries.



Upon his return to Toronto, now a full-fledged professional illustrator, Lazare immersed himself in the business of illustration. He did work for all of Canada's biggest book and magazine publishers, as well as advertising clients.



Lazare also participated in organizing the Canadian Society of Illustrators. In 1995 the modern-day version of that organization, CAPIC, recognized his contribution to the field with a Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2007, more than 60 years after the teenage Jerry Lazare began his ambitious journey as a professional artist, he was inducted into the Canadian Cartoonists Hall of Fame by the Joe Schuster Awards committee.

Jerry Lazare continues to paint and create art to this day. His work can be seen at lazarestudio.com

* The Famous Artists School still exists to this day, albiet under new ownership.  You can check out their website here.

FAS Alumnus, Carl Kock

Another FAS alumnus - with a very different style than Robert Heindel's - is Carl Kock. I wrote about Kock way back in 2006 when I first discovered two beautiful illustrations he did in a volume of the Childcraft children's encyclopedia. Tracking down more examples of this artist's work proved to be difficult - until I found him featured in the Summer '64 issue of Famous Artists School magazine.





Below are the two illustrations from Illustrators, '63 mentioned in Kock's write up. The first certainly demonstrates what Kock talked about when he said the FAS course gave him a sound, basic understanding of drawing...



... and the second (and most of these subsequent pieces) all reinforce what Kock told me when I phoned him back in 2006, that Antonio Frasconi was a major stylistic influence on him.











Later in his career, Carl Kock went into fine art painting. Recently I discovered that he started a blog, and was posting examples of his work up until some time in 2010. I emailed him to see how he was doing, but have not heard back as of this posting.



To see more of Carl Kock's fine art paintings visit his blog at this link.

* The Famous Artists School still exists to this day, albiet under new ownership.  You can check out their website here.

FAS Alumnus, Robert Heindel

I have a small stash of Famous Artists School magazines from the early '60s, which are the source of constant delight to me. Every time I flip through them some new gem of art and/or information reveals itself. This time it was the FAS Student Showcase page in the Autumn '63 issue, which featured the young Robert Heindel.













These examples from Famous Artists School magazine certainly are impressively professional. Heindel clearly had already accomplished much for a young illustrator of just twenty-four. But they barely hint at what was to come later in his career.

Just a few years later...



... and then in ensuing decades.







This week I'm going to share with you some pages from my Famous Artists School magazine collection that showcase students of the program. Some went on to become famous in their own right and, while some others did not, they are, in my opinion, still very worthy of our recognition for their skills and accomplishments.

* The Famous Artists School still exists to this day, albiet under new ownership. You can check out their website here.

H.B. Vestal (1916-2007)

While researching Jack Davis' books on amazon.com for the previous two posts, something interesting came up in amazon.com's related results. First, that John Severin, who was recently featured on TI, illustrated a book in the same series. Comic fans will know that both Jack Davis and John Severin were among the elite comic artists who worked on the now legendary E.C. line of comics in the early '50s. So its interesting to see both of them involved in illustrating Random House's historical books for young readers some 15 years later.

But what really caught my attention was another related result. It turns out an illustrator named H.B. Vestal contributed the art to yet another volume in the series. (I found the cover scan to Vestal's book on Flickr in Marxchivist's set called Books, books, books).



I remembered coming across the name H.B. Vestal in my old magazine collection and set to work digging up those images to scan. Vestal had worked in a second-tier women's magazine called "Everywoman." I don't think I've ever come across any of his illustrations in any other mid-century magazines.



At a glance, you can see that Vestal shared an accomplished ability for ink drawing with both Davis and Severin. That might be why the art director responsible for the Random House series chose him to illustrate one of the "Step-Up" historical book.

Vestal seems to have had a steady client in Everywoman magazine. His work appears regularly in the random sampling of about a dozen issues I have that span the period of 1951 - 1957.



Vestal did many spots and some feature artwork for the magazine. He did quite a few illustrations for a monthly column called "Everywoman's Woman."







It was somewhat challenging finding biographical info on H.B. Vestal... but eventually I found him listed on David Saunders' excellent website, pulpartists.com.



From David's H.B. Vestal page:

Herman Beeson Vestal was born March 27, 1916 in New York City. He became interested in art during his military service. His sketches and watercolors were included in exhibitions of Coast Guard Combat Art, which received press attention.

After the war he returned to NYC and attended the Art Students League.



In 1947 his pen and ink story illustrations began to appear in pulp magazines produced by Fiction House Publications, such as Action Stories, All-America Football, Baseball Stories, Fight Stories, Frontier Stories, Jungle Stories, Lariat, Planet Stories, Two Complete Science-Fiction Adventure Books, Two Western Books, and Wings.



He joined the Salmagundi Club, where his work was included in the 1954 annual art exhibition. His watercolors were singled out for exceptional praise by the editors of American Artist Magazine, which reproduced one of his paintings on their May 1954 cover.





During the 1960s he illustrated several young adult books published by Grosset & Dunlap and Companion Library.



Herman Vestal died in Pittsboro, NC, at the age of ninety-one on September 16, 2007.

* You'll find several examples of Vestal's pulp magazine art at pulpartists.com

* The biographical info on H.B. Vestal is © David Saunders 2011