Centrefold Venus of the Month 20: Jeanne, January 1977

Agent Triple P has had a request for a centrefold from the seventies from a magazine outside the big two.  So here, from January 1977's Oui, is Jeanne.

Oui being a clone of Penthouse it was less concerned about presenting accurate details of its centrefolds so we end up with a nonsensical story about a dancer moving from Chicago to California and then to Colorado...etc.etc etc.

One thing chimes; and that is the reference to Colorado for, despite his continental sounding name and the fact that Oui used many European photographers (due to their arrangement with France's Lui magazine) the photographer was American.

Nicholas DeSciose is a successful Denver-based photographer who got his first camera, a Brownie Hawkeye, at the age of eight.  He took some well known pictures of the Beatles, Rolling Stones and others in the sixties.

DeSciose in the studio thirty years ago

Today he runs a studio in Denver and is a very active photographer working in sports, commercial, editorial, fashion and art photography.

These days apart from his photography he  is also a film cameraman and director and, as such, has won three Emmy awards.

DeSciose was also, from a young age, a nude art model so maybe had rather more in common with his subjects than some photographers. 

Playboy Playmate Moniqe St Pierre poses for DeSciose for Lange ski boots in 1980

Apart from his work in Oui he also shot one Playboy centrefold, Denise McConnell (March 1979).

Oui had always been conceived as a racier version of Playboy and so was able to continue with pussy shots when Playboy's advertisers were asking them to  reverse their earlier explicitness.

DeSciose has gone for a very grainy look and murky lighting for his pictures of Jeanne  which give them a nicely voyeuristic and reportage look rather than the polished perfection seen in Playboy at the time.

Given that it was the mid seventies there was the requirement for the inevitable faux masturbation shots.

DeSciose handles the issue with a series of four shots featuring Jeanne and a telephone.

Without being explicit he manages a sensual quartet of pictures as Jeanne, perhaps, prepares for an erotic phone conversation.

So we like DeSciose's approach to the lovely Jeanne.  It just demonstrates that in the seventies there were some top photographers experimenting with all sorts of approaches to photographing women for mens magazines.  Today, sadly, the over-lit, over Photoshopped, digitally originated pictures of silicone enhanced women who have not a trace of body hair are uniformly dull in comparison.

Centrefold Venus of the Month 19: Lynn Partington, December 1971

We have seen a few pictures of our December (we've nearly caught up) centrefold Lynn Partington on one of our early posts on the Pubic Wars but here is her whole pictorial from December 1971's Penthouse.

Lynn's cover picture features the first bare bottom to appear on the cover of Penthouse.

Berine Cornfeld knows that money can buy anything, however ugly you are!

Her pictorial was shot by Bob Guccione himself at financier Bernie Cornfeld’s 12th century French Chateau.

Cornfeld was a friend of both Bob Guccione and Playboy’s Hugh Hefner. The only time the two met was at one of Cornfeld’s Hollywood parties. Guccione was polite to Hefner who, in return, snubbed him completely. They never spoke again.

 
There are some typical Guccione touches in her pictorial including out of focus foreground elements; taken to extremes here.
 
 

 
 

Considering Guccione always wanted his girls to appear as if they were unaware of a hidden voyeuristic viewer spying on them, there is an unusual amount of eye contact with the camera in this pictorial.

 

 

It's also nice to see a smile even if Lynn has to compete with another Guccione trademark; a big flower!

 

 

According to the accompanying text Lynn was 5'5" tall, measured 35-21-35 and came from Sale in Cheshire.  Whether any of that is accurate is unknown, of course.

 

 

What we do know about her was that before she posed for Penthouse she was actually a bunny girl in the London Playboy Club something the text, of course, fails to mention.

 

 

Lynn was in a TV studio in 1968 when she met cheesy Radio 1 disc jockey Tony Blackburn, who had been filming his show Time for Blackburn in Southern TVs studios in Southampton.  Overwhelmed by her leggy loveliness he offered her a lift back to London in his brand new E-Type Jaguar.  They stayed together for two years.

Lynn with Tony Blackburn

They broke up shortly after she moved in with him.  He had to get up early to present his morning radio show and she was out until the small hours in nightclubs.  One day he had gone down to the West Country to do a personal appearance and when he returned she had gone for good.  She didn't telephone or leave a note; just left her bunny ears and tail on the bed!  She later went out with singer Jack Jones and now lives in America.

At this point Penthouse and Playboy were in the early stages of what would become the Pubic Wars.  Lynn's pictorial included six pictures where she was flashing her fur; a record for both magazines.

Lynn's loveliness is such that she can even hold your attention when having to compete with two out of focus flowers in the foreground which make it look like she is having giant truffles thrown at her.

This is Triple P's favourite picture from the shoot and not just because he has always wanted to live somewhere with a spiral staircase in it.  Lynn looks moodily magnificent; looking defiantly high maintenance and difficult to please.  A challenge, certainly!

This picture is also remarkable as in it Lynn shows a glimpse of her outer labia; another first for Penthouse. This area had been absolutely taboo for the men's magazines and any hint of labia were airbrushed out. It wouldn't be until 1973 that other examples of this area being revealed would appear.

In 1972 Lynn appeared in this advertisement for Akai's groundbreaking video recorder.  If you shelled out $1,295 for it they threw in a film session with a Penthouse Pet!  Bargain!  Although it should be borne in mind that a brand new Ford Pinto only cost $2,078!  I wonder if Lynn ever had to do a filming session?

In 1973 Lynn was up for Pet of the Year with four other girls (Patricia Barret (top left on the cover above) won eventually, although she wouldn't have been Triple P's choice.  Lynn's picture on the cover (bottom centre) was also a barrier-breaker as you could just glimpse a little corner of her pubic hair on it; the first time this had appeared on a nationally distributed magazine in the US.

Inside there were two additional pictures of Lynn.  The first of these was a nice portrait of her smiling from the same window she had hung her bottom out of for her original cover shot.

The second, and our final look at Lynn, is this bold legs apart shot which is the full version of the cropped picture on the cover.  What a fantastic creature!

Venus with a Snake: 8 Noémie Lenoir

Whilst researching for the previous post we came across these shots of gorgeous French model and actress Noémie Lenoir.  She is best known, here in the UK, for being the lingerie model who has, until recently, regularly featured in the blockbuster Christmas TV adverts for Marks and Spencer (a retailer who, until comparatively recently was famous for not advertising on TV). 

Noémie in the M&S 2009 Christmas TV advert which 6 people thought was "offensive and demeaning to women"  Just jealous that they didn't look that good in knickers, we think!

The 2009 version received a number of complaints (well, eight) to the Advertising Standards Authority over a very brief sequence of Noémie prancing around a fake forest in lingerie.  It was sexist. the complainants maintained.  Good grief!

Born in France she has a French father and her mother comes from the island of La Réunion and has Malagasy blood which explains her exotically lovely looks.  She was spotted by Ford models at the age of sixteen and the 5'10" tall model has had a high profile career modelling for  L'Oréal, Gap, Next and Victoria's Secret. 

Noémie displays herself for Sports Illustrated

She has also appeared in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition.  Noémie has, more recently, appeared in a number of minor film roles.  She has gone through the de rigeur relationships with a rapper, a footballer and a millionaire playboy but was taken to hospital last year after a suspected suicide bid.

This was all at a time when her boyfriend, Zurich-based playboy Carl Hirschmann, was under investigation for alleged sex, blackmail and extortion activities involving other models.  Basically, he would film them having sex with him, it is said, and then try to blackmail them over it.  Why is not clear as he certainly doesn't need the money.

Hirschmann, who had previoulsy numbered Paris Hilton, actress Tara Reid, former Miss Switzerland, Whitney Toyloy, and Israeli model Bar Rafaeli as his girlfriends (unfair, surely) was also accused of havig sex with a 15 year old model. Lenoir was supposed to be distraught over the stories coming out about Hirschman.  He sounds like an utter slimeball, actually, Noémie.

Late last year it apeared that the fabulously wealthy Mr Hirschmann had been let off all charges.  Hmm.

Sadly, Noémie was dropped by Marks and Spencer last year (before the suicide bid).  She had a larger part than usual in her last film, Rush Hour 3 (2007) so maybe we will see her on the big screen again.

Noémie.  Attracted to snakes

Her snake (another albino python) pictures are rather good although we can't help think feeling that whilst having a live snake for an accessory is sort of justifiable in a studio shoot or outside, its presence in a house is rather harder to reason.

Why someone with such a lovely body would despoil it with tattoos is, as ever, inexplicable.  Anyway we hope Mlle Lenoir is feeling more positive about her life and continues to brighten up the planet.

Venus with a Snake 7: Nastassja Kinski and the Serpent et al.

Nastassja Kinski and the Serpent (1981) by Richard Avedon

On June 14th 1981 veteran photographer Richard Avedon (1923-2004) took the then 19 (or 20, depending on your source) year old actress Nastassja Kinski into the studio and draped a large python around her lithe form to create one of the most iconic (and copied) photographs of the twentieth century.

The picture on display before the Christies sale

The picture was reproduced as a best-selling poster and a limited edition of 200 signed photographic prints were made the following year.  In 2008 one of these sold at Christies for $74,500.

Other photographers soon realised that the image of a naked girl entwined with a large snake would always get a positive reaction (except from people who suffer from ophidiaphobia, of course).   Several other young women found themselves having to cuddle up to pythons for hugely derivative shots. 

Sonja Kinski by Michel Comte (2003)

Notably, twenty years later, Kinski's daughter Sonja appeared on the cover of the 400th edition of Photo magazine in a picture by Michel Comte.

Sonja Kinski

Sonja also posed for this upright shot.  The yellow snake isn't a different breed it is just an example of an albino python.

Stephanie Seymour by Todd Barry

Earlier, original supermodel Stephanie Seymour had also snuggled up to a serpentine friend in this picture by Todd Barry which also replicates the chunky bracelet.  Incidentally this picture is the source for an internet fake purporting to be Natalie Portman.

Fake Natalie Portman

Someone has photoshopped a face onto this picture and it is widely available on the internet as Portman.  Clearly, however, the snake, bracelet, body and hair are from the original Barry picture with a face added.

Nadja Auermann

On the basis that nothing succeeds like excess here is German model Nadja Auermann positively enveloped in pythons.

Next we have model Devon Aoki photographed by Anthony Mandler who is now more famous for being a prolific director of pop videos.  Devon is the daughter of Rocky Aoki who was the founder of the Benihana restaurant chain as well as the mens' magazine Genesis.

My favourite interpretation has to be this final one in Lego.  Brilliant!  More girls with snakes another time.