In the pre-Stonewall era before the advent of the gay rights movement, male nude photography was kept underground. Photographers feared police confiscation, harassment, and worse. This volume uncovers the work of ten different photographers produced during this suppressive period—images hidden away for a generation in private collections and closed archives. The majority have never been published. A full range of styles is included: gleaming muscle gods shot in the physique magazine style, sun-dappled outdoor nudes from the 1960s, and artful black-and-white studio portraits by George Platt Lynes. Uncovered restores a lost chapter to the history of the male nude photograph and reintroduces more than one hundred unsung classics of male erotic photography to the world.
“Uncovered offers a veritable smorgasbord of ‘rare vintage male nudes’…From the advances in the quality of the photography to the evolution of the models’ haircuts, the book functions, in a nontraditional way, as a survey of the changing fashions of the 20th century – minus, of course, the actual fashions." ~Metro Source
“Uncovered, culled from private collections, closed archives and the deepest recesses of censorship in American history, an exceptional collection of dramatic and sexy images defined by aesthetic sensibilities ranging from the starkly classicist to the frankly erotic.” ~GayWired.com
“Massengill’s precise essays provide historical context and critical insight, making Uncovered that rare collection of male nudes with copy as engaging as the pics. They should’ve called it Unexpected.” ~ModernTonic.com
"Reed Massengill's book Uncovered: Rare Vintage Male Nudes reveals a treasure trove of images by famous shutterbugs of the not-so-innocent
’30s, ’40s and ’50s." ~Time Out New York
