Strike a pose

"Leading Ladies," the new calendar benefitting breast cancer awareness in Northwest Alabama, is different from most images you'd find in a specialty calendar store. There are no slick shots of race cars, aquamarine Greek seascapes or cute puppies. Instead, you'll find modernized pinup pictures of local models posed on vintage airplanes or batting their kohl-lined eyes behind Asian parasols.

That's just how Manique Singleton wanted it.

"I have an infatuation with pinup calendars," said Singleton, innovator and art director of the calendar. That infatuation led her to recruit local photographers such as Amanda Chapman to capture belly dancer Gina Thompson and other local women in glamorous moments.

When she got the idea for the calendar three years ago, Singleton doubted she could get all the volunteers she needed.

"I really desired that everything be local because the money is going to local cancer research," Singleton said.

She gathered those volunteers, including additional photographers Jake Jones and J.T. Tomlin, and started working on the calendar in June.

Most of the calendar was shot at GAS Commercial Photography Studio in Tuscumbia, but the picture for March, depicting a model perched on a yellow 1946 Piper J-3, was shot at model Marleyne Smith's parents' home on the Tennessee River.

Images range from the coquettish, with the May model sucking a lollipop, to the flirty, in a picture of a blond model seemingly emulating Marilyn Monroe, showing a lot of leg. An ethereal picture of the red-haired, fair-skinned Thompson, wearing a white dress while lying down gazing at the camera upside down, could pass as a shot from a glossy fashion magazine. Singleton said making a tasteful pinup calendar proved challenging, but she feels she never crossed the line to risque. "We don't want to make it raunchy by any means," she said.

"It's a pinup (calendar) but it's still very modern ... the calender is new and innovative, but there's still that classic sexiness."

"I think it's absolutely beautiful," Smith said. "It's a calendar people would want to look at."

Pinup calendars have a history of appealing to soldiers away from home, but photographer Robert Rausch, owner of GAS Studios, feels the women involved in the calendar kept the pictures from portraying only a man's point of view.

"One thing is, they had a woman photographer and mainly women working on it, so it wasn't a man's view," said Rausch. He said the whole perception of pinups has relaxed through the generations. "At the time, they were probably racy, but today they're just beautiful."

Singleton's grandmother, a cancer survivor, inspired her to start a project that benefitted breast cancer awareness. The American Cancer Society locally will distribute 100 percent of proceeds toward breast cancer awareness.

"There's many ways to communicate awareness about the disease," said Kara Neloms, communications and marketing specialist with the American Cancer Society in Huntsville. ..."The American Cancer Society is dedicated to eliminating cancer as a major health problem through research, education, advocacy and service."

On Dec. 16, Old Town Tavern, also where Singleton works, will host a calendar release party where pictures that didn't make the calendar will be auctioned off. Next year, Singleton hopes to include local musicians in the calendar for a roadhouse theme.

Jennifer Crossley can be reached at 740-5743 or jennifer.crossley@timesdaily.com.