Maurice Vellekoop

Citing inspiration from early gay giants like Drummer and Stroke's Harry Bush (Hard Boys), midcentury artist George Quaintance, and of course Tom of Finland, illustrator Maurice Vellekoop carries on their tradition of depicting handsome, self-assured, masculine men in lust and, crucially, with a sense of humor. Vellekoop uses a brighter, more cheerful palette to draw his joyful frolics and the results may give rise to, among other things, confusing questions. Can such flat, simple pictures be hot? Yes. Is it wrong? No. Frankly, some viewers can't / won't / don't want to be turned on without a frisson of guilt or shame. There's not a shadow of those in Vellekoop's magazine work -- which you've seen in The New Yorker, the NYT, Wallpaper, Vogue, Rolling Stone, Out, EW, et al -- nor in his gay books like his solo manly Pin-ups or his alpha-male (!) ABC Book: A Homoerotic Primer with XXX sex scenes for each letter.