Alberto Vargas — Esquire Magazine (United States, 1940s)

Peruvian-American artist Alberto Vargas created the famous “Varga Girls” pinup illustrations for Esquire magazine starting in the early 1940s. These elegant pinup art pieces featured idealized pinup girls painted in airbrushed watercolor and gouache.

His pinup portraits became so popular that servicemen often cut them out of magazines and pinned them inside lockers, barracks, and aircraft. Vargas later continued his work for Playboy magazine in the 1960s, further shaping the modern pinup illustration style.