Interesting thread on what is decidedly a hot-button topic. (I can remember a time on WIX, not so long ago, when this thread probably would have been stoutly locked by now!)
It might be worth saying that the cyclical rise and fall of nose art is, itself, an element of history--what a given society will, and won't, stand for at a certain point in time. Of course the direction (and force) of the political wind is a major determining factor...but it's all history in progress.
For the record...I like nose art, and beyond that I have a great appreciation for the talents of the likes of Varga and the others whose idealized, but superbly rendered, female images were often the basis for the famous World War II-era aircraft pinups. (I do paintings of airplanes myself, but can't draw or paint people worth spit...)
Two locally-connected examples:
At the Hamilton airshow, back in the day, there was an FB-111 unit Stateside--I forget the unit number--who would usually send an "Aardvark" for static display. The year of Desert Storm, a lot of WWII-style nose art began showing up; the FB-111 that came to the Hope that year was no exception. It had a version of the famous girl-sitting-in-a-giant-martini-glass artwork, and the name "Slightly Dangerous". The name was repeated in stencil form on (or above, I forget) the nosewheel doors. Very, very cool. Next year: another FB-111 from the same unit. The name "The Screamer" was stenciled near the nose gear...but whatever corresponding artwork had adorned the nose was gone. (There had been a change in the White House in the interim, FWIW). I have always wondered what the art was like on "The Screamer"...
CWH had, and has, a nice B-25J. When first restored in the 70s it wore a plain 98 Sqn RAF livery honouring F/O David Pudney DFC. Then one year around 1990 or so, just before Geneseo, the Mitchell suddenly gained a nicely-painted Varga-style nude (based on the "girl on the phone" painting) and the name "Hot Gen!". This was from another 98 Sqn Mitchell, not just a made-up adornment. ("Gen", of course, is a UK colloquialism for "info", but also sounds sort of like a female name). The Mitchell braved the slings and arrows of the PC crowd for several years. Then, all of a sudden, "Hot Gen!" vanished...replaced with a decaled-on rendering of Disney's "Grumpy". To be fair, "Grumpy" was another 98 Sqn Mitchell, and Disney characters were very common nose-art subjects too. And CWH has a large and successful children's program, to whose participants "Grumpy" would need much less explanation! But, well, this just wasn't as cool as "Hot Gen!" had been. I've half a mind to poll WIX to see which of the three liveries we enthusiasts/internet malcontents
would most like to see on the Mitchell: Pudney's without nose art at all; "Hot Gen!"; or "Grumpy". But I think I can guess the result anyway...
Cheers
S.
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