Vietnam War pin-up magazine artwork

Lovecat magazine is a fanzine-style publication covering fashion, music, art and beauty, and features photography from both top and up-and-coming fashion photographers. For the latest issue, 'The Return Of The Bombshell', illustrator Mat Maitland of London design studio Big Active was commissioned to create artwork for a six-page story. He collaborated on the project with New York-based photographer Steven Baillie.

Ballie shot simple studio pictures of American model and singer Cassie that Maitland then used within his artwork. "Using the issue’s theme, I approached the images as a set of Vietnam War-style pin-ups, albeit updated in my style," he explains. "I always associate the word 'bombshell' with a certain period in Hollywood history that just so happens to coincide with the Vietnam war, so I wanted to combine these two themes."

Working in Photoshop CS6, Maitland used a combination of Ballie's photographs and imagery from his own archive to create an eye-popping series of spreads in his signature collage style, featuring cats, bullets, chains and coconuts. "They were very happy," he smiles. "Cassie and P Diddy, her partner, also loved the results."

This showcase was originally published in Computer Arts issue 206.

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