Russ Warner (1917–2004) was an American

physique photographer Physique photography is a tradition of photography of nude or semi-nude (usually muscular) men which was largely popular between the early 20th century and the 1960s. Physique photography originated with the physical culture and bodybuilding movem ...

. His photographs of bodybuilders appeared widely in physique and bodybuilding magazines of the 1950s and 1960s. His photography studio was initially located in

Oakland California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the Bay ...

; he later relocated to the

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

area.

Biography

Warner Studios ad Tomorrows Man v2 n3 1954

Warner was born Russell S. Warner in 1917. He died on 21 October 2004 in

Escondido, California Escondido is a city in San Diego County, California, United States. Located in the North County region, it was incorporated in 1888, and is one of the oldest cities in San Diego County. It has a population of 151,038 as of the 2020 census. Et ...

Career

Originally a bodybuilder himself, Warner began photographing fellow bodybuilders after World War II. Unlike many other prominent physique photographers of the time, Warner was heterosexual, though he was aware that gay men comprised a significant portion of the audience for his photos.

Models

He photographed models in posing straps as well as in the nude. Warner's models included many bodybuilding titleholders and fitness experts. He famously photographed the duo of Junior Mr. America Jack Thomas and future television star

Jack LaLanne Francois Henri LaLanne (; September 26, 1914 – January 23, 2011) was an American fitness and nutrition guru and motivational speaker. He described himself as being a "sugarholic" and a "junk food junkie" until he was aged 15. He also had behav ...

in the nude. LaLanne later attempted to buy and destroy all prints of the photo set, apparently out of concern for their homosexual connotation. In 1955, Warner's studio was raided. As a result, Norm Tousley, a man who had modelled for Warner in a posing strap, was fired from his position as a lieutenant of the Oakland Fire Department. Investigators and prosecutors typically targeted physique photographers, publishers, and consumers; scholar

Thomas Waugh Thomas Waugh is a Canadian critic, lecturer, author, actor, and activist, best known for his extensive work on documentary film and eroticism in the history of LGBT cinema and art. A professor emeritus at Concordia University, he taught 41 years ...

characterizes this incident as "the most prominent case involving victimization of a model".

Innovations

Warner was known as the inventor in 1954 of an indoor lighting technique known as "rim lighting", in which he used floodlights to light a model against a black backdrop to highlight the details of their body.

Mail order sales

At some point before 1951, Warner was interviewed in Washington by postal inspectors regarding his distribution of nude photographs with "inked-in" posing straps (a common practice at the time, which allowed customers to easily remove the doctored pouch to reveal the full photo). He sold nude photographs by mail order up to the late 1950s.

Magazines

Warner's studio was one of six featured in the debut issue of ''

Physique Pictorial ''Physique Pictorial'' is an American magazine, one of the leading beefcake magazines of the mid-20th century. During its run from 1951 to 1990 as a quarterly publication, it exemplified the use of bodybuilding culture and classical art figure pos ...

'' (then titled ''Physique Photo News'') in 1951, the first of the gay-oriented physique magazines which would achieve wide popularity through the 1950s and early-to-mid 1960s. Warner, along with

Bob Delmonteque Bob, BOB, or B.O.B. may refer to: Places *Mount Bob, New York, United States *Bob Island, Palmer Archipelago, Antarctica People, fictional characters, and named animals * Bob (given name), a list of people and fictional characters *Bob (surname ...

George Quaintance George Quaintance (June 3, 1902 – November 8, 1957) was an American artist, famous for his "idealized, strongly homoerotic" depictions of men in mid-20th-century physique magazines. before the title was later relaunched in 1959 by

H. Lynn Womack Herman Lynn Womack (1923–1985) was an American publisher, and the founder of Guild Press, a Washington, D.C., publishing house that catered almost exclusively to a gay male audience and played a major role in expanding the legal protections for g ...

. During the early 1960s, Warner worked for

Joe Weider Joseph Weider (; November 29, 1919 – March 23, 2013) was a Canadian bodybuilder and entrepreneur who co-founded the International Federation of BodyBuilders (IFBB) alongside his brother Ben Weider. He was also the creator of Mr. Olympia, Ms. O ...

, providing photographs for his organization's wide catalogue of magazines, which included gay-oriented posing strap titles like ''

Tomorrow's Man ''Tomorrow's Man'' was a digest size physique magazine published from 1952 to 1971. It was one of the first physique magazines, debuting a year after Bob Mizer's ''Physique Pictorial''. It was the creation of Irvin ("Irv") Johnson, a Chicago gym ...

'' and ''Vim'', as well as titles which were seriously devoted to bodybuilding and physique culture, such as ''

Muscle Builder ''Muscle & Fitness'' is an American fitness and bodybuilding magazine founded in 1935 by Canadian entrepreneur Joe Weider. It was originally published under the title ''Your Physique'', before being renamed to ''Muscle Builder'' in 1954, and acq ...

'' and ''Mr. America''. Warner continued taking photographs for bodybuilding magazines for several decades thereafter.

Notes

References

Bibliography

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External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Warner, Russ Physique photography 20th-century American photographers 1917 births 2004 deaths