Description
By the late 1980s and early 1990s, Bettie Page had fully crossed over from forgotten 1950s pin-up model into underground cult icon. Publications like Betty Being Bad helped drive that revival, circulating through comic shops, alternative bookstores, conventions, and mail-order catalogs at a moment when collectors were actively rediscovering Irving Klaw photographs, bondage imagery, cheesecake magazines, and the broader visual culture surrounding mid-century glamour photography. These weren’t mainstream nostalgia items yet—they still felt slightly illicit, underground, and collector-driven.
Compiled and designed by John Workman, Betty Being Bad leans more heavily into Bettie Page’s nude and fetish-oriented imagery than many of the earlier revival-era fanzines, which likely explains the title itself. The publication mixes photographs, graphic design, fan scholarship, and underground publishing aesthetics in a way that now feels deeply tied to the pre-internet Bettie Page collector boom. The rear cover advertisement featuring artwork by Dave Stevens—whose own obsession with vintage glamour helped reignite interest in Bettie Page—adds another layer of historical significance for collectors of pin-up culture, underground comics, and alternative publishing.
A genuinely strong artifact from the first major Bettie Page revival wave of the late twentieth century.
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