Sinful Sunday 448 – Poster boy

Anyone who grew up in the UK in the 80s undoubtedly had at least one Athena poster on their bedroom wall. Their art prints and posters were as ubiquitous as their subject matter, ranging from cute kittens and fast cars to art-deco seascapes and air-brush kisses. At least two of their posters have become genuine icons of the late 20th century.

Tennis Girl

L’Enfant

I certainly had several Athena posters on my wall, and spent not an inconsiderate amount of time browsing through their catalogue, mostly pining over the fact that my parents would probably go ballistic if I stuck most of the posters I really wanted on my bedroom wall. [Ed: As you can probably guess, Dear Reader, AM wasn’t so interested in the kittens and seascapes.] But I made up for that a little by using them as starting points for some of my own drawings.

This was pretty much a direct copy of one such picture.

Meanwhile, inspired by the likes of L’Enfant, a school friend of mine paid to have a set of black and white photos professionally taken (his pose was topless – abs and biceps tensed as he tugged on a towel) convinced he could make money from selling large-format prints. As buff as he may have been, to the best of my knowledge, he failed to break even.

Three decades on, perhaps I could adorn the bedroom walls of fawning teens and students? Or failing that, the bedroom walls of middle aged pervs?