Cadmus - Part 1

This one’s a two-parter—and honestly, it has to be. Paul Cadmus’s work is just too broad, too influential, and too important to squeeze into a single post. We owe him a lot—especially when it comes to putting male beauty and same-sex desire, both romantic and erotic, out into the open.

1. Male Nude - Paul Cadmus

Paul Cadmus (1904–1999) lived on both sides of the camera and the canvas. Known for his stylized, often provocative male figures, he blurred the line between observation and desire—drawing and painting bodies he also photographed, studied, and lived alongside. Cadmus is right there at that turning point where the male form starts shifting from something coded… to something a little harder to ignore.

2. Portrait of Paul Cadmus by Luigi Lucioni

3. George Tooker by Paul Cadmus

4. Male Nude - Paul Cadmus

With Jared French and Margaret, it’s PaJaMa (Paul, Jared, Margaret)—passing the camera around, photographing each other and their circle, often nude, often staged. Lovers, collaborators, co-conspirators.

5. PaJaMa L-R Paul Cadmus, Jared French, and Margaret French

6. Jared French by Paul Cadmus

7. Jared French by Paul Cadmus

Their orbit included George Platt Lynes, along with artists like George Tooker and Luigi Lucioni, and extended outward through Lynes to figures like authors, Christopher Isherwood and Lincoln Kirstein, co-founder of New York City Ballet with revolutionary choreographer, George Balanchine. Different mediums, same people… all feeding each other ideas, and showing up in each other’s work in ways that make authorship a little fuzzy.

8. Horseplay - Paul Cadmus

9. Narcissus - Paul Cadmus

10. Jerry - Paul Cadmus

Thoughts?