Serge Jacques & Paris-Hollywood
Sunday, January 22nd, 2017
Another subversive erotic photographer from the 1950s-60s was a Frenchman named Serge Jacques. He published the leading pin-up magazine in France for over a quarter of a Century. Cinema Paris-Hollywood in 1946 evolved as Paris-Hollywood through to 1952 and became Les beautes de Paris de Hollywood until 1953. From that year through to 1974 the magazine hit it’s real stride as Folies de Paris et de Hollywood. The magazine included erotic images by well regarded international photographers and models and printed 80,000 copies per fortnight at it’s height.
Yet there’s not a lot to be found on the Internet about Serge Jacques, beyond his pictures and magazines. He was once arrested in the street for possession of an erotic photograph displaying pubic hair that was inside his locked briefcase; the police regularly raided his studio and darkroom. The court appearances were numerous and as a result some issues of Folies de Paris et de Hollywood were deemed offensive to the public and removed from sale.
In the finest tradition of Taschen two books of his photographs were published – Serge Jacques (1998) and Paris-Hollywood (2001). That Taschen chose to publish two books of Serge Jacques’ photographs speaks to his importance as a photographer.
