Happy Happy 100th Birthday to Tom of Finland
Tom, whose real name was Touko Valio Laaksonen was a Finnish artist who made a huge influence on late 20th Century Gay Culture.
Born into a middle class family in a small town in the south west of Finland. Both his parents were school teachers. At the age of 19 he moved to the capital Helsinki to study advertising. During his spare time he became obsessed with the drawing of erotic male images of male labourers he had observed from an early age. In 1940, with Finland joining the war, he became a second lieutenant in the Finnish army. He later said that his fetish for men in uniforms came from his time in the war. Although he hated the principles and philosophy of the Nazis he thought they had the sexiest of uniforms.
After the war had finished in 1945 he returned to his studies. His drawings now became more relaxed with less assertive poses but still with muscular bodies. He went on to work in advertising and in 1956 he submitted some drawings to the USA publication ‘Physique Pictorial’ under the name Tom which the editor of the time Bob Mizer coined into the name TOM OF FINLAND. This magazine has just been relaunched in 2017 by the Bob Mizer Foundation.
Over the years his drawings developed to show ultra masculine and muscular men, dressed in leather or denim a long way from the stereotyped gay man as sad, sensitive and passive. Tom’s men were definitely enjoying their sexual adventures with a gleam in their eye and a big smile on their faces .
After the heavy censorship of the 1950s and 1960s a time came when gay sexual imagery had a more mainstream appeal. Tom gave up his full time work at the internationally renowned McCann-Erikson ad agency. He later said “Since then I have lived in jeans and lived on my drawings”.
It could be said that he defined and created the gay “CLONE” image of the 70’s and 80’s with his homo erotic depiction of leathermen, cowboys, farmhands, policemen, military guys, construction workers…….. which undoubtedly established the gay look and inspired the forming of the Village People pop group.
Between 1968 – 1986 he created the character KAKE, his leather clad super sex hero and his adventures were published in 26 episodes of 20 
pages of drawings. KAKE existed at a time when men were men, sex was carefree and everyone seemed to wear a big thick moustache, large bulges in their crotches and overly worked muscular bodies.
Tom lived out most of his personal fantasies through KAKE for the rest of his life. His legacy and iconic drawings will live on forever.
There is a Tom of Finland foundation that has a shop selling a bizarre range of products. We particularly like the KAKE inspired face mask so useful if you are going out these days. There have also been several semi documentary films of his work and life.
In Paris the famous international gay porn star, Francois Sagat, is working on an adult film project called “Future Erotica” which captures the hyper-homo iconography of Tom of Finland.
So raise a glass to TOM 100 today and thanks for changing our gay lives.
GRAHAM FRASER Queerguru’s Culture, Fashion and Arts Correspondent was once half of the award winning FASHION DESIGNER duo WORKERS FOR FREEDOM. Years spent working in the luxury end of INTERNATIONAL FASHION he now lives with his partner the artist RICHARD NOTT and their two Cavapoos Albert and Raf in a stunning renovated 1950’s house on the edge of the Sussex Downs with distant sea views.
P.S. Queerguru thinks you may also like to check out :
https:// queerguru.com/queerguru-parties-at-tom-of-finlands-iconic-la-home/
https:// queerguru.com/pekka-strang-talks-about-being-gay-icon-tom-of-finland/
