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In the world of cult fame,
Eric Stanton holds a unique position. For years his artwork
has been enjoyed around the globe, appreciated by millions,
yet few will admit to knowing his work publicly, fewer still
will even admit to knowing his name. Such is the fate of
a fetish artist.
If ever there
was a creative individual from the sexploitation era that
engaged me, it would be him. In some ways, I've adopted
him, projected on to him, made him a central focus of my
sexploitation era investigations. I see him both as a survivor,
an outsider artist worthy of praise, and maybe something
of a misfit (which may account for some of my affection
for him). But there's no question in my mind that he's an
icon and that he remains to this day one of the most pirated
underground artists in the world.
Biographical
facts about his life are often contradictory and murky;
and sometimes he would contribute to this misinformation
personally. There's even some question of his real name:
was he born “Ernest Stanzoni” as claimed
in the huge Eric Kroll coffee table book? Or is his birth
name “Ernest Stanten,” as claimed by Belier
publisher and personal friend and associate, J.B. Rund?
Most of what
I know about the sexploitation era and the subgenre of what
was then labeled “bizarre,” which today would
be assigned fetish culture or kink, I've learned through
tracking Stanton. He remains, in some strange way, a central
figure for me (my own personal Dante) whose life intersected
with other curious characters of the day, artists and business
people, gangsters and hacks ... shadowy and mythologized
figures I've come to admire and who I never grow tired of
hearing about: Irving Klaw, Bettie Page, Gene Bilbrew, Lenny
Burtman, Eddie Mishkin, Stanley Malkin.... And then, of
course, there's Steve Ditko, Spider-Man co-creator and Stanton's
friend-as well as his studio mate of 10 years.
When it comes
to the sexploitation era, there are so many unverifiable
facts. Eric Stanton lived and operated in a subterranean
culture where few people kept records and everyone operated
under a multitude of aliases. This was the sexploitation
era preceding XXX; a time when any association with “porn” could
get you arrested. And most of the characters involved were
arrested and brought to trial—often repeatedly: Irving
Klaw, Lenny Burtman, Eddie Mishkin, Stanley Malkin.... In
this period, operations connected with producing this sort
of “smut” were tracked by government
agencies, Postal Inspectors (who acted as censors, with
strong ties to the local police), even the Catholic church
(hugely influential then); and these publisher/distributors
were raided. Irving Klaw's Nutrix warehouse, Lenny
Burtman's Exotique editorial office, Stanley Malkin's Queen's
warehouse, virtually anything connected to Eddie Mishkin
was under surveillance and sooner or later put under wraps—at
least temporarily. Even the working studio shared by Steve
Ditko and Eric Stanton was subjected to a police raid with
all the materials confiscated and much of it destroyed.
Eric Stanton
was born and raised in Brooklyn, the child of Russian immigrants.
The true direction of his life took shape when he wrote
to Irving Klaw—then an underground publisher and distributor
of kink material—and boasted to Klaw that he could
"do better," meaning better than the fighting
girl episodes he had purchased via his mail order business.
Invited to show what he could do, Stanton contributed his
own sexy catfight illustrations, which although primitive
Klaw bought and later sold, taking on the young man at his
legitimate shop, Movie Star News.
Irving Klaw
established Movie Star News largely to sell movie star photos
and Hollywood ephemera, but following 1947, on the suggestion
of a customer, he entered the fetish trade, building his
catalog with anything he could get his hands on: customer/practitioner's
contributions produced outside or inside his store (where
he would set up monthly bondage shoots), European acquired
kink material originally sold by Charles Guyette (a local
merchant and his predecessor in the kink trade) and illustrations,
photographs and art by John Coutts, aka John Willie.
In 1949, Klaw
would also start producing underground fetish-oriented films,
in addition to commissioning illustrated kink-pulp stories
(bondage serials). Eric Stanton would contribute where he
could, starting in 1948 (by some accounts) or 1949 (by others).
Although Eric
Stanton's first work for Klaw seems to be “fighting
girl” episodes, his first bondage serial contribution
appears to be the latter half of "Poor Pamela"
(the first 5 pages or episodes produced by
another artist [as per publisher J.B. Rund]).
(Reproduced in BIZARRE COMIX, vol. 3, the 1970s)
Two notable
works from the Irving Klaw 1950's period produced by Eric
Stanton—true masterpieces of fetish art—were:
“Bondage Enthusiasts Bound In Leather,”
book 1& 2
Reproduced by Belier Press from surviving photo prints.
“Pleasure Bound,” Books 1 & 2
Reproduced by Belier Press from surviving photo prints.
In the early
1960s, after he moved his kinkster base of operations from
New York to New Jersey, Irving Klaw would publish different
versions of these same serials under his Nutrix imprint.
Unlike the bondage serials sold as loose single page episodes
printed on photographic paper, these 5 x 7" versions,
featuring cropped and edited versions of the original illustrated
serials, were bound (stapled) and sold for the first time
as “books” or illustrated novellas. Distribution
was via mail order and through adult bookshops (like those
owned by other Stanton employers, Stanley Malkin and Eddie
Mishkin, along Times Square).
“Bondage Enthusiasts Bound In Leather,” v. 3
“Bondage Enthusiasts Bound In Leather,”
v. 4
“Pleasure Bound,” Book 1, Vol. 1
“Pleasure Bound,” Book 1, Vol. 2
Detail: Original Nutrix Bulletin (advertisement issue #53)
Original Klaw Nutrix Bulletin (featuring “Cruel Duchess” ad)
While it appears
that Eric Stanton generally stopped working for Movie Star
News after Klaw moved his fetish-oriented operations to
New Jersey—during which time Eric Stanton disastrously
took a “straight job” as a parts clerk of
Pan-American Airlines (apparently to please his wife)—evidence
shows that he contributed to Klaw's imprint after 1960 with
a series of booklets offering new art. So not all Nutrix
booklets featuring Eric Stanton material are recycled from
older serials.
(This is a
hand-copied version of one of Klaw's post 1960 Stanton booklets—purchased
directly through Stanton's “Archives” mail
order business. When Eric ran out of genuine material, he
would personally reproduce it on his in-house xerox machine.
The letter symbol in the upper corner—“V”—is
a catalog marking [his Conneticut POB address stamped inside].)
Detail: Original Nutrix Bulletin (advertisement issue #30)
“Vacation In Fetterland,”
Vol. 1,
just another of Klaw's many Nutrix booklets
(All part of my personal Eric Stanton collection.)
Thanks, Eric!
© 2011 Richard Perez
“Ready-made
for Russ Meyer—
assuming, that is, if Meyer was around and still at his peak.”
—Josh Alan Friedman, author: TALES OF TIMES SQUARE, WHEN SEX WAS DIRTY
Dolores & Serena:
“They were young and immoral!...”
 
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