PRE-REVOLUTIONARY QUEER
Bob Mizer (1922-1992), United States Male physique model posed with sword and column, c.1954 Gelatin silver print KI-DC: 52508 Donated in 1954 This material is copyrighted and may not be reproduced without permission.
Bob Mizer’s photographs were sold under the name Athletic Model Guild, a company he founded in Los Angeles in 1945. Two years later he was sentenced to six months in prison for sending photographs of nude men through the mail. Although his mail order forms included statements that the AMG did not distribute nude images, many of the Mizer photographs in the Kinsey Institute’s collection feature nude models. In 1951 Mizer began publishing Physique Pictorial magazine, which featured his own photographs as well as reproductions of artwork by George Quaintance, Etienne (Dom Orejudos), Tom of Finland, and Steve Masters (Michael Miksche).
