Description

Eric Stanton’s personal favorite comic caper was also a loving (if crackpot) homage to John Willie’s legendary damsel-in-distress creation, Sweet Gwendoline. Stanton delivers a Mad magazine-like sendup of Willie’s original, complete with Will Elder-like funny business. And yet even with all this slapstick, Stanton’s female leads, including the imperious Countess, the pliant Gaga and the innocent Gwen, are as gorgeous as any he’s ever drawn, and the fetish wear, bondage play, and femme-on-femme fights are as rousing as ever. Stanton’s pencils were inked by Steve Ditko, who also contributed some original art, while the two toyed with the creation of Spider-Man in the spring of 1962. This special edition was reconstructed from archival material, correcting earlier printings and designed to display the risqué humor of Stanton’s art.

Eric Stanton
Eric Stanton (1926-1999) was a pioneering illustrator of fetish art, who believed that every artist should be free to follow his (or her) own muse. And he risked his entire career on this belief, even if it meant living underground in complete obscurity. His association with Steve Ditko, Irving Klaw, Bettie Page, Gene Bilbrew, and other figures of the New York underground of the 1950s and ’60s, is the stuff of legend.

You can read more about his early years of struggle and doubt in the hardcover book, Eric Stanton & The History of the Bizarre Underground (now available on Amazon), which features over 400+ illustrations/photos and the backstory of Irving Klaw, Bettie Page, Charles Guyette, Steve Ditko, Gene Bilbrew, Leonard Burtman, and so many more…