THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, August 14, 1996 TAG: 9608140024
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ALVA CHOPP, CORRESPONDENT
LENGTH: 88 lines
THE FLIGHT lines were galleries, the planes canvases.
On nose after warplane nose, American airmen of World War II painted portraits of their wives or girlfriends back home, as well as movie stars, hometown skylines and cartoon characters - reminders of the things they missed from half a world away.
Captioned with rude taunts to the Fuhrer and saucy double-entendres, this ``nose art'' became an important outlet for the creative talents of America's aviators, a boost to morale - and a lasting symbol of the war.
Now a collection of nose art in photographs and actual chunks of aircraft fuselage is on exhibit, through Sept. 23, at the MacArthur Memorial in downtown Norfolk.
The display, titled ``Risque Business,'' depicts the psychological bond that developed between air crews and their flying machines - machines imbued with personalities of their own with the unofficial addition of paint on metal.
``Morale was the main reason for most of the art,'' said Jess Acosta, the memorial's curator. ``These aircraft became a part of the crew. When you spend 10 to 12 hours in a bomber, it becomes your home.''
The painted designs, products of whatever talent and supplies might be around, made it plain that aviators in Europe and on sun-drenched Pacific islands had friends in common: trusted partners who took them to battle and on whom they depended to return safely to base.
``We often used movie stars as inspiration,'' said Col. Bob Bigelow, 73, a former B-29 pilot who remembers flying several aircraft with nose art and who is now a member of the Confederate Air Force, a group dedicated to restoring, preserving and flying such planes.
``One plane called `Widespread Havoc' was a painting of movie star June Havoc. It showed her straddling a bomb,'' he said. ``Personalizing the plane was a diversion to the horror and boredom of combat.''
Pilots and crews often referred to their own and other planes by their art or nicknames, rather than by impersonal numbers. ``When a plane got shot down,'' Bigelow said, ``you'd hear someone on the radio say, `They just got so-and-so,' never the plane number. And everyone knew which aircraft they meant.''
Acosta added, ``It was bad luck to change the name of the aircraft.''
True, some of the paintings might fail to pass muster today, politically speaking: Even during the war, nose-painted nudes were accepted only in combat zones; naked flesh was usually covered with painted-on bikinis or drapes before the planes returned to the States.
Even so, the war's end saw no real effort to save the art. Planes were melted down by the hundreds, and the men who had so carefully painted the images were more concerned about getting on with their lives.
Luckily, photographs remain of many designs.
Groups like the Confederate Air Force, which boasts 135 flying vintage planes in its inventory, have recreated some images: The CAF's holdings include a B-24 Liberator nicknamed ``Diamond Lil,'' illustrated with a nude brunette draped in fur and diamonds, that visited Newport News last week.
And a few art works survive on pieces of aluminum skin cut right from the planes that once surrounded them. Those on display at the MacArthur Memorial are drawn from private collections and before now have been exhibited only at the Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz Museum in Fredericksburg, Texas.
``It was our connection with home,'' Col. Bob Peters, another CAF member, said of the art.
``It was common practice for the crew to pat the girl on the airplane before a flight. It was considered good luck.'' MEMO: `Risque Business' is open to the public from from 10 a.m. to 5
p.m. Monday through Saturday and from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sundays. For
more information, call 441-2965. ILLUSTRATION: Photo
MacArthur Memorial
Color photo
VICKI CRONIS/The Virginian-Pilot
ABOVE LEFT: The ``Green Dragon'' Squadron was part of the 5th Air
Force in World War II.
ABOVE: Pinup pictures and double-entendres played a large part in
air crews' art work.
Photo
VICKI CRONIS/The Virginian-Pilot
Arthur Jones, visiting from Maine, looks over nose art on display at
the MacArthur Museum in Norfolk. Jones worked on a ground crew for
planes flying in the Pacific during World War II. by CNB