62
special report
Finding a way to portray the positions was difficult. To print photographs
of a couple was out of the question—it would have been seen as highly
pornographic—so the solution was to use illustrations. The answer came in
the form of Charles Raymond, who agreed to pose anonymously for the book
with his wife, a German model. The photo shoot took place over two days
in the winter of 1971, with Chris Foss taking the groundbreaking shots. “I used
the camera as a sketchbook, taking pictures I could use to draw from.
I had never photographed two people naked, let alone copulating, and
it was so difficult to light and illustrate the two bodies as the important bits
are fairly well hidden.”
The context the book was set in was extraordinary and it was a
huge risk to work on such material. “I had a long contract to say that
Mitchell Beazley would pay all of my court costs if I was prosecuted
for doing the drawings,” recalls Foss. “The shoot was during the Miners’
Strike when electricity was rationed. We would be in the studio
with Charlie [Raymond] mid-flow and the power would just cut out.
We could have all been arrested.”
The fluid and anatomically correct pencil drawings that Foss created had
an irresistible voyeuristic appeal. These were preceded by a series of delicate
colour paintings by Raymond, offering an impact in the introduction and a
taste of what was to come. The task for the design team of the new book was to
spruce up this Seventies aesthetic while still tackling the subject matter head-
on. Illustration styles have come and gone since the Seventies and computers,
seen by Foss as a hindrance—”those touch-screen computers are like doing
something intimate with gloves on rather than with bare hands”—are now an
important tool for many modern-day illustrators.
“ It was a hard book to design, choosing the right kind of illustration
that complemented the updated text. It had to be modern with no
antiquated element, yet we wanted to hold onto the sexy elements
of the first book and the charm of the bearded man,” says senior
art director Juliette Norsworthy.
Twenty-eight-year-old illustrator Russell Faulkner, a graduate in Graphic
Design Media at the London College of Communication, was commissioned
for the project. “I had to find the middle ground between a Haynes manual
and illustrated storytelling,” he smiles, “and try not to think about the first edition
too much otherwise I would be too intimidated by the amazing illustrations.”
Working from photographs of the two models who appear throughout the
book, Faulkner created simplistic pencil drawings that outline the couple. There
were then scanned into Photoshop, where he colourised them, combining
digital and traditional methods. “I created forty-eight illustrations, taking about
a day and a half on each one. It was a very difficult task as it is such a sensitive
subject,” he admits. “The drawings were done at A3 and then they scaled them
down which gives the details in the drawings a nicer quality.”
The cookbook template utilised in the early editions has remained,
with themed sections such as appetisers, main courses, and sauces
and pickles dividing up the subject matter. The chapters build slowly,
moving logically from simple to more complicated manoeuvres as
the book progresses. The centre of the book is the most erotic section
and as such is purely illustrative. This is complemented at either end
by photographs which set the scene and keep it in tune with
reality. The new text has been written in Comfort’s style, allowing any
alterations to fit in seamlessly with the original copy. “I have made
a lot of changes,” says Quilliam. “There is more to say now and I had
to bring in new research and up-to-date attitudes, but I left in
The New Joy of Sex is published all the things that Alex Comfort championed.” This latest edition is a
on 8 September, £18.99.
contemporary and engaging read but the design of the original
www.octopusbooks.co.uk
www.chrisfoss.net
book has such an endearing quality that while the content may be
tame in today’s world, the sexual adventures of Bearded Man
www.laurentfetis.com cannot be surpassed.
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