The Way We Wore

Review of “J.C. Leyendecker: American Imagist,” by Laurence S. Cutler and Judy Goffman Cutler Review by Michael Quinn

What are you wearing as you read this? A shirt from Under Armour? Leggings from Lululemon? Sneakers? Flip-flops?

A hundred years ago, the world was different, and we dressed differently. But it was around this time that advertising first started to get a lock on the nation’s consciousness and influence what people wanted to wear through the power of a well-placed image—a spell we are still under.

We’re so bombarded with images these days that it’s hard to remember (or imagine) a time when a picture was something special and rare. Think of how many you’ve seen today alone, waking up, scrolling through your phone. This abundance should feel like an embarrassment of riches. Why, then, can it feel so overwhelming?

Around the turn of the 20th century, this craziness began. Magazines popped up like mushrooms after a rainstorm. Their eye-catching covers depicted illustrations of gorgeous people in gorgeous clothes. These images established aspirational ideas about how to look, how to live, and what to value.

One of the most influential tastemakers of the early 20th century was a German American artist named J.C. Leyendecker (1874–1951). His technical skill was masterful, his compositions methodical, and his aesthetic phenomenally romantic. In his work, we see the origins of the “All-American” ideal. The men he painted are athletic but elegantly dressed, with thick necks, chiseled jaws, and gleaming, perfectly parted hair. In off-the-shoulder furs and tight taffeta gowns, his women are long-necked, slender creatures with springy curls and downcast eyes. The work is very “Great Gatsby,” and there is some speculation that Leyendecker, who knew author F. Scott Fitzgerald, might have inspired him with his own rags-to-riches mysterious past.

Leyendecker came from nothing and rose to the top of the heap. He was a branding pioneer (creating the “Arrow Collar Man,” a hunky yet refined “man’s man” sex symbol designed to sell shirts) and, through the 322 covers he created for the Saturday Evening Post, the prototypical influencer. It’s because of Leyendecker that we associate New Year’s with a baby, Mother’s Day with flowers, and the Fourth of July with firecrackers. He was worshipped by Norman Rockwell (whose fame eclipsed his), yet unlike Rockwell, he worked with live models, not from photographs. And unlike Rockwell, who was something of a media hound, Leyendecker was notoriously private and requested his papers be burned upon his death. Little is widely known about him.

An exhibit at the New-York Historical Society (Central Park West and 77th Street) provides an important clue about why. “Under Cover,” guest-curated by Donald Albrecht with coordination by Rebecca Klassen, is a small and powerful show of Leyendecker’s paintings. In one, we see an attractive woman surrounded by men. She leans over a ship’s railing to catch the eye of one of them—who’s slyly looking at another man. Today’s audience will recognize things in these paintings that the intended audience did not: homoerotic overtones.

Leyendecker’s most prominent model and muse, Charles Beach (1881–1954), was his life partner of nearly 50 years. The men were gay at a time when that wasn’t an allowable public identity. This is why Leyendecker kept a low profile—and perhaps the reason his name isn’t so well-known today.

“Under Cover” is a gem of a show that runs through August 13. The museum’s bookstore was out of copies of a related book, “J.C. Leyendecker: American Imagist,” by Laurence S. Cutler and Judy Goffman Cutler, but it’s worth getting a copy from your local bookstore. Published in 2008, this oversized hardcover is a delight for the senses. The authors, founders of the National Museum of American Illustration in Newport, Rhode Island, pull from a collection of over 1,300 images from the “Golden Age of American Illustration” (1895–1945) to help us understand how Leyendecker’s work continues to influence and inspire us today.

We learn more about Leyendecker’s background through the Cutlers’ meticulous research. Born in Germany, one of four children, he went by Joe. The J.C. allegedly stood for “Jesus Christ”—perhaps a way for the family with Sephardic Jew ancestry to throw off the wolves before the family emigrated to Chicago. Joe was closest to youngest brother Franz (known as Frank), who was also gay and phenomenally talented but couldn’t stomach the artistic compromises commercial work demanded: “I despise myself for doing them, although I HAVE to do them,” he later complained to a sympathetic model. A drug addiction later derailed Frank’s career, eventually cutting his life short.

Joe apprenticed at an engraving house as a teenager and took night classes in art. He and Frank saved up to study in Paris with Alphonse Mucha, founder of the art nouveau movement. Toulouse-Lautrec’s posters of can-can girls were all the rage then, seeding an idea in Joe about the power of commercial art. The Cutlers write that he “believed his greatest impact as an artist was creating images easily reproduced, immediately recognized, and broadly distributed.”

The brothers moved to New York, and their careers took off. Beach showed up at their door one day, looking to model. Standing 6’2” with huge shoulders, massive biceps, and a tiny waist, he stood in marked contrast to the sallow and serious-looking Joe (the Cutlers call him “physically unimpressive”), who recognized Beach as his ideal and spent years documenting his magnificent physique. Beach, in turn, helped manage Leyendecker’s studio and career and kept sycophants at bay. (Rockwell resented the men’s closeness, calling Beach “a real parasite—like some huge, white, cold insect clinging to Joe’s back.”)

The perspective of Leyendecker’s paintings is sometimes from below, so the heads look small and the hands look huge, emphasizing brawn over brains. (Flip through the book, and you will agree: there is no better painter of hands.) Leyendecker allegedly smeared his models with oil to capture the glean off their well-defined muscles and chiseled cheekbones, but watch what happens when he wants your eye to pay attention to the clothes in an ad. No matter how gorgeous the model is, your eye goes right to the clothing. Everything is illuminated to magnificent effect.

Speaking of clothes, the New-York Historic Society sells a few articles inspired by the show in its shop. You can find them online too. While some of the selection (snazzy hats and bowties) befit a dandy, the most prominently displayed shirt is undoubtedly the most popular and says the most about how we dress now. It features two of Leyendecker’s beautiful, beautifully dressed men from a more beautiful time… on an oversized orange tank top.