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thesis entitled

THE’INFLUENCE OF CUBISM
AND ITS STYLISTIC DESCENDENTS, FUTURISM
AND CUBO- FUTURISM ON ADVERTISING AND GRAPHIC ARTS

IN COLLIER' S. THE NATIONAL WEEKLY MAGAZINE, 1 905-1930
prevented by

 

Kell y McSpadden Harle

has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for

degree in History of Art

 

 

(Department of Art)

(KR/1:15 Gx-I (WW

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Phylis A . Floyd

 

Date May 14, 1992

 

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THE INFLUENCE OF CUBISM
AND ITS STYLISTIC DES CENDANTS, FUTURISM
AND CUBO-FUTURISM ON ADVERTISING AND GRAPHIC ARTS
IN COLLIER'S: THE NATIONAL WEEIEY MAGAZINE, 1905-1930

By
Kelly McSpadden Harle

A THESIS
Submitted to
Michigan State University

in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Department of Art
1992

 

 

472—3673

ABSTRACT

THE INFLUENCE OF CUBISM
AND ITS STYLISTIC DESCENDANTS. FUTURISM
AND CUBO-FUTURISM ON ADVERTISING AND GRAPHIC ARTS
IN COLLER'S: THE NATIONAL WEEKLY MAGAZINE, 1905-1930

By

Kelly McSpadden Harle

The inﬂuence of cubism on advertising and graphic arts in early
twentieth-century American magazines is a topic which has not been
adequately addressed in the study of Modern Art. The 1905- 1930 issues
of Collier’s: The National Weekly magazine were chosen to study the
effects of avant-garde art styles on the visual arts illustrated within this
magazine.

This investigation conﬁrms that cubism and its stylistic
descendants, futurism and cubo-futurism, effectively communicated the
fast-paced, rapidly industrialized, commercial environment emerging
during the mid-teens through the 19203. As the technology of products
became more complex, advertisements and graphic designs inﬂuenced by
cubism appeared more sophisticated, adapting stylistic features to suit a
particular item. In addition, artists successfully expressed the chic,
fashionable qualities of predominantly male-oriented products using
these abstract styles. Fragmented and multi-faceted images aided in
expressing the intangible qualities of the consumer goods being
advertised.

 

 

ACKNOWLEDGNIENTS

I would like to thank the members of my thesis committee,
Professor William Kilbourne, Jr., and Professor Raymond Silverman, for
their encouragement, advice and genuine interest in my research. In
addition, I would like to express special appreciation to my thesis advisor
and mentor, Professor Phylis Floyd, for her guidance, expertise and
editorial assistance that proved invaluable to this project.

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES .............................................................................. ii
INTRODUCTION ................................................................................. 1
I. What is Cubism? ............................................................................ 3
A. European vs. American Cubism ........................................... 6
II. Modem Art and Its Inﬂuence on the New Magazine ........................ 9
A. Graphic and Advertising Arts ................................................. 12
B. The Cover ............................................................................. 19
C. The Layout ............................................................................ 21
D. Typography ........................................................................... 25
111. Advertising Art in Collier’s: The National Weekly Magazine ............. 27
A. 1905-1914 ........................................................................... 28
B. 1915-1919 ........................................................................... 35
C. 1920-1927 ........................................................................... 40
D. 1928 .................................................................................... 42
E. 1929-1930 ........................................................................... 50
IV. Conclusion ................................................................................... 61
BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................. 98

GENERAL REFERENCES .................................................................... 1 02

ii

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Design by Robert Foster that appeared in L. B. Siegfried’s
“Modernism Emerges Full-Fledged,” Advertising and
Selling (February 8, 1928). ................................................... 66

Figure 2: Franklin Automobile Company advertisement that
appeared in Don Gridley’s “Is Modern Advertising Art
Modern Enough?,” Printers’ Ink (April 2, 1925). ..................... 67

Figure 3: The Seven Arts advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (November 1 1, 1916). ............................... 68

Figure 4: Collier’s: The National Weekly cover for
October 1 1, 1913. ................................................................. 69

Figure 5: Collier’s: The National Weekly cover for
November 19, 1927 ............................................................... 70

Figure 6: Collier’s: The National Weekly cover for
November 12, 1927. .............................................................. 71

Figure 7: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 24, 1917). ..................................... 72

Figure 8: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (August 25, 1917). .................................... 73

Figure 9: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (February 24, 1917). ................................. 74

Figure 10: Design by Robert Foster that appeared in L. B.
Siegfried’s “Modernism Emerges Full-Fledged,”
Advertising and Selling (February 8, 1928). ........................... 75

Figure 1 1: The Mentor advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (September 7, 1929) ................ 76

Figure 12: “Art with the Appeal of a Bullﬁght,”
Collier’s: The National Weekly (February 15, 1913). .............. 77

iii

Figure 13: “An Exhibition by the Unexhibited,”
Collier’s: The National Weekly (January 31, 1914). ............... 78

Figure 14: Mecca advertisement that appeared in
Collier's: The National Weekly (February 6, 1915). ................. 79

Figure 15: Mecca advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (April 24, 1915) ....................... 80

Figure 16: The Delineator magazine advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 8, 1919). ....................................... 81

Figure 17: The Delineator magazine advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 29, 1919). ..................................... 82

Figure 18: Robert Haven Schaufﬂer, “Where have I heard that tune
before?,” Collier’s: The National Weekly (July 3, 1926). .......... 83

Figure 19: Nameographs, Collier’s: The National Weekly
(February 25, 1928). ............................................................. 84

Figure 20: Knox Hat advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (May 12, 1928) ........................ 85

Figure 21: Gillette Safety Razor Company advertisement that
appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly
(June 30, 1928). ................................................................... 86

Figure 22: Gillette Safety Razor Company advertisement that
appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly
(July 28, 1928). .................................................................... 87

Figure 23: Western Electric advertisement that appeared in
Collier's: The National Weekly (October 13, 1928). ................. 88

Figure 24: Thorens Inc. advertisement that appeared in
Collier's: The National Weekly (November 24, 1928). .............. 89

Figure 25: Advertisement for the book At Sea by William O’Brien
that appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly
(December 29, 1928) ............................................................. 90

Figure 26: Nation's Business advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (July 6, 1929). ........................ 91

Figure 27: Nation’s Business advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (August 10, 1929). .................. 92

 

 

iv

Figure 28: Nation’s Business advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (September 14, 1929). ............. 93

Figure 29: Bendix Aviation Corporation advertisement that
appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly (July 27,
1929) .................................................................................... 94

Figure 30: Cast Iron Pipe advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (September 7 , 1929) ................ 95

Figure 31: Cast Iron Pipe advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (October 5, 1929). ................... 96

Figure 32: Postum Company, Inc. advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (February 8, 1930). ................. 97

 

 

 

INTRODUCTION

Although the impact of popular arts has been the focus of recent
studies, such as Kirk Varnedoe and Adam Gopnik’s High and Low:
Modern Art and Popular Culture exhibition of 1991 , sponsored by The
Museum of Modern Art, New York, the inﬂuence of cubism on advertising
and graphic arts in American magazines, is a topic that has not been
adequately addressed in the study of Modern Art. Avant-garde art styles,
such as cubism, had a noticeable impact on the American advertising
and design industries, essentially serving as a catalyst for innovative
ideas and design concepts that helped shape twentieth-century applied
arts.

The assimilation of the cubist style in American magazines had a
profound effect on the evolution of modern advertisements and graphic
design and will be discussed in the study through an analysis of Collier’s:
The National Weekly magazine. This magazine did not discriminate
among its readers and therefore, attracted the interest of both male and
female subscribers during the ﬁrst quarter of the twentieth-century. For
this reason, Collier’s is an excellent source to study the eﬁects of
contemporary abstract styles on advertising and graphic arts in
American magazines.

The beginning of the formal development of cubism in Europe was
1907. Writing in 1988, John Golding asserts: “. . . Les Demoiselles

 

 

2

(1907) marks a turning point in the career of Picasso and, moreover, the
beginning of a new phase in the history of art. It is, too, the logical point
to begin a history of Cubism.”l

Collier's: The National Weekly had a long history in the American
magazine industry, and although Collier’s ceased publication in 1957, it
remained a model for later family-oriented magazines. It served as a
contemporary prototype demonstrating the impact avant—garde styles
had on mass-media and their success during the early decades of the
twentieth-century. Collier’s was just one of the many magazines that
helped bring about cultural literacy by employing new abstract styles
such as American cubism, futurism and cubo-futurism, within its pages.
Examples of cubist inﬂuenced designs were found in Collier's as early as
the middle-teens of the twentieth-century, in the art of illustrations for
short stories, page borders and typography designs.

Another factor that inﬂuenced my choice of Collier’s was that it
reported on important cultural developments in the United States.
Collier’s published reviews of contemporary artistic events such as the
1913 International Exhibition of Modern Art (The Armory Show) held in
New York City. Such articles, in addition to similar reports in this and
other journals, helped to promote the public’s eventual acceptance of

 

avant-garde art styles. In the decades since the 19208 Collier's: The
National Weekly has maintained a meritorious reputation as a reformer
in the magazine industry due to its achievements in the world of graphic
design and advertising (applied arts). These accomplishments were also
reﬂected in the ﬁne arts during the same period.

 

lJohn Golding. Cubism: A History and an Analysis 1 907-1 914 (Cambridge.
Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. 1988). 33.

 

3
After analyzing the advertisements and illustrations in Collier's

from the mid-teens through the 19205, I discovered trends that were not
only related to avant-garde artistic progress in the United States, but
also, and what was more important, the technological achievements that

were transpiring simultaneously during this period.

I. What is Cubism?

For centuries, ﬁne artists (painters and sculptors) had depicted
their subjects naturalistically, thus they relied primarily on a mimetic
approach torecord visual appearances. During the four hundred years
from the Renaissance to 1907, artists employed various art styles, yet
they were still essentially traditionalists.

On the other hand, John Golding notes that the Cubists

. . . were the beginning of something completely new; in a sense they
were anti-traditionalists. Their way of looking at the exterior world. the
means they used of recording their ideas about it. even their concept of
what a painting was, all these things were different from anything that
had gone before them. And they were reacting not only against the art of
the past fifty years but also against the techniques and traditions of
vision that had shaped Western painting since the scientiﬁc discoveries

of the early Renaissance.

The foundation of these artistic standards began to be challenged
beginning in 1907 in Paris.3 Philip B. Meggs, a leading authority on the
history of graphic design, wrote in 1983: “by creating a concept of design

independent of nature, cubism began a new artistic tradition and way of

 

21mm 60.

3“In its beginnings, however, and until about 1912, cubism was an exclusively
Parisian phenomenon. and it probably could not have been born elsewhere. for reasons
of history. geography. and culture. No other city in the world in the early years of the
twentieth-century could boast of a comparable century-long history of outstanding
artistic activity: and the relatively central location of Paris in western Europe served
only to facilitate the migration of the most gifted young artists . . ." (Cubism. Edward F.
Fry (London: Thames & Hudson, 1966], 1 l).

 

 

4

seeing that ended the four-hundred-year—old Renaissance tradition of
pictorial art.”4 Artists such as Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque
challenged artistic traditions based on a single point of view, symmetrical
compositions and naturalistic representation. These avant-garde artists
put forth their own artistic doctrine, basing their concepts on the
paintings and methods of Cézanne.5 African wooden sculptures and
other functional objects such as the Kota reliquary ﬁgure from Gabon
served as abstract and conceptual models.6 These two inﬂuences relied

on the language of form to enhance the expressive message of a design.7

 

4Philip B. Meggs, A History of Graphic Design (New York: Van Nostrand
Reinhold, 1983), 274.

5“Ce’rzanne. the French precursor of cubism. had urged artists to concentrate on
cones. cubes, cylinders and spheres. Taking this as their cue, the Cubists then reduced
natural objects to geometric shapes and reconstructed them as planes and solids” (A
History of Design from the Victorian Era to the Present. Ann Ferebee [New York: Van
Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1970], 78): In addition. see Ron J ohnson. “Prirnitivism in
the Early Sculpture of Picasso.” in Arts Magazine 49. no. 10 (June 1975). 64. Johnson
discusses the relationship of Gauguin and Picasso and the impact Gauguin's works had
on Picasso which helped form the background of Picasso's primitivism.

6Golding, 47. Golding notes, “Tribal sculpture and the painting of Cézanne.
both of which were used extensively by Picasso as sources for the Demoiselles, were to
be the two major inﬂuences in the creation of cubism; in fact the constant inspiration
which Picasso and Braque drew from the art of Cézanne and the stimulation which
tribal sculpture provided for Picasso were the only important outside inﬂuences in the
development of a style which was to be very self-contained. Ultimately the process of
creation is one of intuitively balancing formal elements. and. in the case of the most
abstract tribal sculpture, the finished product has the quality not of a representation
but a symbol—a re-creation rather than reinterpretation" (Golding. 50); For a general
discussion of the inﬂuence of primitive sculpture upon modern painting during the
early twentieth-century, see Robert Goldwater. Primitivism in Modern Art (Cambridge,
Massachusetts: The Harvard University Press. 1986). 143. In this passage Goldwater
compares African sculpture from different countries. and notes their similarities to the
images found in Picasso‘s paintings; See also William Rubin. “Picasso.” in “Primitivism'
in 20th Century Art. vol. 1. William Rubin. ed. (New York: The Museum of Modern Art,
1984), 241.

7“As opposed to Western Art. tribal art is more conceptual. much less
conditioned by visual appearances. The tribal sculptor tends to depict what he knows
about his subject rather than what he sees. Or, to put it differently, he tends to express
his idea of it. This leads inevitably to great simplification or stylization, and at the same
time, to a clarification and accentuation of what are felt to be the significant features or

 

 

5
Furthermore. the conceptual emphasis enabled cubist artists to detach

themselves from visual appearances without neglecting the subject
matter.8 Simpliﬁcation or stylization of the subject based on principles of
formalism and the arrangement of objects in a shallow picture space
resulted in the formation of a new art movement called Cubism. Frank
H. Young, writing in 1930 notes:

Cubism had an interesting theory that concerned complete vision. It
held that an object seen from one side is an incomplete vision and that a
complete vision would show a synthetic view taken from all sides and
within. Cubists practiced another theory in which the real planes of a
picture were dissociated and reorganized without regard for natural
proximity, in order to create. as they maintained. a more expressive
structural form of the subject. Unirnportant planes were subdued and
those more important brought forward. emphasized and allowed to
overlap as desired. In other words. the cubist painter strongly believed in
ridding his pictures, as much as possible. of nonessentials and bringing

forward the elements which to him were most significant.9

Beginning in 1907 and continuing through the mid-teens, the
cubist movement inspired experimentation and stylistic innovation in
modern abstract artists. As Robert Rosenblum's research has shown
several phases mark the progressive evolution of cubism. These phases
include analytical cubism, synthetic cubism and collage or papiers
collés.lo Each of these stages had its own unique and individual

characteristics.

 

 

details of the object depicted“ (Golding. 50); The Day of The God. 1894 is used to explain
Gauguin’s major form of expression in his paintings (Goldwater, 72).

8William Rubin, “Modernist Primitivisrn: An Introduction.” in “Primitivism” in
20th Century Art. vol. 1, William Rubin, ed. (New York: The Museum of Modern Art,
1984), 1 1. Rubin discusses the shift in early twentieth-century modernism from
perceptual to conceptual imagery.

9Frank H. Young, Modern Advertising Art (New York Corrci, Friede, Inc., 1930).
20.

10Robert Rosenblum, Cubism and Twentieth-Century Art (New York Harry N.
Abrams. 1966), 71.

 

6
A. European vs. American Cubism

“The course of Cubism in America began after 1910, as in England,
with a sudden and unprepared explosion of modernity,” wrote Robert
Rosenblum in 1976, “and was then followed by a quieter assimilation
that often combined both the aesthetic reﬁnement and the ultimate
commitment to a particularizéd reality."1 1 American avant—garde artists
unlike their European counterparts, employed the cubist style in their
works in a more naturalistic manner. Douglas Cooper wrote in 1971: “In
1913, American painters still mostly favored social realism in their choice
of subjects and worked with a palette of strong colors. But the Armory
Show revealed that several young Americans who had gone to Europe
were currently working, either in New York or Paris, in a style that owed
something to Delaunay and moreover to Futurism.”12 The American
cubo-futurism style was particularly suited to visually expressing
intangible characteristics of technology and industry, as well as
fashionable, exotic products advertised in American magazines such as
Collier’s. “Again, it was cubism that carried the greatest impact in the
awakening of American art to contemporary European developments,”
maintains Robert Rosenblum, “though, as might be expected in the most
mechanized environment of the contemporary world, it was cubism
strongly tinged with a futurist ﬂavor.”13

The United States’ ﬁrst formal exposure to European cubism
occurred in 1913 at the International Exhibition of Modern Art held in New

 

11Ibid..241.

12Douglas Cooper. The Cubist Epoch (New Yorlc Phaidon Publishers. Inc..
1971), 176.

13Rosenblum, 24 1.

 

 

7
York City's Armory building. In addition, works by some American

artists such as Stuart Davis, who was inﬂuenced by the cubist
movement, were also on display. For most Americans this was the ﬁrst
opportunity to view the radically new style of painting known as cubism.
Because of the high degree of abstraction present in the works at

the Armory Show the overall response by the American public and art
critics to these new works was one of shock and distaste. However, there
were groups of American artists such as the Ashcan school, whose
members included Stuart Davis and John Sloan, who were already
exercising avant-garde visual techniques made famous by European
modernists. 14 Another group, headed by Alfred Stieglitz, was known as
“291.” Members included John Marin, Marsden Hartley and Alfred
Maurer and others, who were profoundly affected by the artistic visual
techniques of cubism.15 The impact of the Armory Show on the
development of Modern Art in America was enormous, and in effect it
aided in forming the foundation of an American modern tradition. 16

Avant-garde American artists developed their own unique style, but
it was based on the foundation of the basic principles set forth by the

 

14Robert Hunter. “The Rewards and Disappointments of the Ashcan School: The
Early Career of Stuart Davis,” in Lower Stokes Sims, Stuart Davis: American Painter
(New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 199 1), 3 1.

15Diane Kelder, “Stuart Davis and Modernism: An Overview,” in Lowery Stokes
Sims. Stuart Davis: American Painter (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art,
1991). 19.

16Ibid: See also Milton W. Brown, The Story of The Armory Show (New York: The
Joseph-H. Hirshhorn Foundation, 1963), 87. Brown discusses how United States’
cultural environment lagged twenty-five years behind European modernism, and that
after the Armory Show, the American public should have been less eager to condemn
modernism. Brown notes that the Armory Show aided in forming the foundation and
eventual acceptance of Modern Art in America because the exhibition was the ﬁrst
major display of the development of avant-garde art. 90.

 

 

8
early European modernists. For instance, artists such as Picasso and

Braque used primarily still-lifes and ﬁgures as subjects for their works.
Essentially, the images were abstracted, at times beyond recognition;
however, crucial to these artists was the idea or conception of the image.
American artists, on the other hand. found it more difﬁcult to deny
naturalistic representation, and consequently their efforts resulted in
images more “realistic” in style than those of the European cubists.
Avant-garde American artists placed signiﬁcant emphasis on highly
detailed images, more so than their European counterparts.l7

Because the American cubists were primarin inspired by the world
that surrounded them their works were labeled Cubist-Realism, as
Barbara Rose notes in her 1975 study of American art: “. . . the cubist-
realism of Demuth and Sheeler was the more distinctively American
version of cubism. And it had a more lasting effect on American art.”18
Most of the American avant-garde artists lived in New York City, which
was known among artistic groups as the cultural and artistic center of
the United States. These artists chose as their subject architecture,
monuments and the hustling and bustling crowds of major metropolitan
cities, such as New York and Chicago. “The New York scene provided an
especially rich opportunity to convey the drama of the new urban

experience with the comparably new vocabulary of cubism, and the most

 

17“For the majority of Americans who called themselves Cubist, cubism meant
little more than sharp lines and acute angles. Cubism was seen not as a new attitude
of the mind, but in terms of its surface effects. Thus, many blithely set about
superimposing directional lines and fragmented shapes on top of essentially a realistic
composition” (American Art Since 1900, Barbara Rose (New York: Praeger Publishers,
1967], 85).

18Barbara Rose, American Art Since 1900 (New Yorlc Praeger Publishers, 1975),
90.

 

 

9

assertively modern monuments of the city were often recorded.”19
Modern American artists could effectively portray New York and its
symbolic characteristics, utilizing elements from abstract art styles such
as cubism, in addition to a vivid array of bold colors and a naturalistic
pictorial depiction.20 The combination of these elements enabled the
artist to express a technologically advanced, culturally literate and highly
energetic urban environment that was characteristic of American

metropolises.

II. Modern Art and Its Inﬂuence on the New Magazine

Newspapers, magazines, books and radio were advertisers’ primary
mediums for communicating their message to the public in the early
twentieth-century. In fact, American magazines serve as a “window” into
the culture of this revolutionary modern era. They are a valuable
medium that inﬂuenced the lives of millions and reﬂected the tone of a
modern visual culture. Setting the standards for future publications,
early twentieth-century American magazines such as Collier’s: The
National Weekly, reported to the public on international, political, social,
cultural, and entertainment news.21 Consequently, Collier's and other
magazines of the period helped shape modern society by reinforcing and
promoting creative cultural trends. “While articles and advertisements

perhaps generated more action, the arts of ﬁction and poetry, in addition

 

lgRosenblum, 241.

2oKirk Varnedoe and Adam Gopnik mention that Stuart Davis and Gerald
Murphy were two contemporary American artists who “absorbed Ferdinand Leger’s
geomcterized planes of color and monumentalizing simplicity” (High and Low: Modern
Art and Popular Culture. Kirk Varnedoe and Adam Gopnik [New York: The Museum of
Modern Art, 1990], 293). Refer also to n. 12.

21Hickman Powell, “Collier’s,” Scribner’s Magazine (May 1939), 21.

 

 

 

10

to the graphics, made magazines a treasured source of what was
commonly known as culture. ”22

The emergence of the “new magazine,” spawned by imaginative
designs created by avant-garde ﬁne and applied artists, occurred shortly
after the turn of the twentieth-century. The term “new magazine” refers
to a revamping phenomenon that took place in the American magazine
industry beginning in the ﬁrst decade of the twentieth-century.23 The
ﬁrst phase of this restructuring process is known as the transitional
phase, that occurred from 1900 through the mid-teens.24 Magazine
editors, publishers and executive managers decided to modify the
magazine’s appearance by employing a greater use of pictorial graphics.
Theodore Peterson describes this transitional period in his history of
twentieth-century magazines:

Because many magazines adopted standard pages of about nine by
twelve inches, editors had to use such devices as hand-lettered titles,
white space, drawings and photographs, and so on. to break up the
monotony of their pages. As advertisers made increasingly skillful use of
artwork, typography, and white Space, editors were encouraged to dress
up their own pages. In time they came to realize that design could
contribute as much to the personality of their magazines as the editorial

content they ran.2
By the end of the transitional phase, artists were incorporating
contemporary styles into advertisements. As artists increasingly utilized

 

22Dorey Schmidt. “Magazines in American Culture,” in The American Magazine,
1890-1940 (Fall 1979), 9.

23Ann Uhry Abrams. “From Simplicity to Sensation: Art in American
Advertising, 1904-1929,” in Journal of Popular Culture 10 (Winter 1976), 621; See also
n.26.

24mm.

25Theodore Peterson, Magazines in the 'Iiventieth Century (Urbana. Illinois:
University of Illinois Press, 1964). 36.

 

 

11

avant-garde styles, a new phase began that expanded the functions of

abstract styles such as cubism. In 1976, Ann Uhry Abrams wrote:
. . . this transitional period, with the new techniques available for
reproducing artwork in mass-circulation magazines, advertisers
borrowed from several contemporaneous movements in ﬁne arts. For the
first two decades of the twentieth-century, advertisers seemed so
intrigued by the very fact that they could use art lavishly that they did so
with a certain carelessness. They became absorbed in the medium and
neglected the message. Artists were given license to experiment with
composition and technique in order to display the fine arts as an
aesthetic adjunct to advertising. But after advertisers became imbued
with the uses of psychology for advertising, in the mid-teens, a new trend

began. Illustrations were by no means abandoned. but the emphasis
shifted from art for its aesthetic purposes to art as a carefully fashioned

vehicle for enticing readers to buy.

Elizabeth Hawkes afﬁrrns this conclusion, “The pictorial images
were subtle persuaders which captured people’s imaginations and
enticed them to read the stories or to buy the products advertised.”27
The visual needs of the new magazine were fulﬁlled through the use of
photographs, illustrations and graphics, and these elements of the
modern magazine. Abstract visual imagery was developed as a leading
method of communication. The expansion of modernism in high art
inspired commercial artists to replace the naturalistic images of earlier
advertisements with abstract and increasingly stylized representations of
products. Writing in 1956, James Playsted Wood describes the modern
magazine, noting “Brevity and sharpness characterize today’s
magazines,” Wood adds, “They are timed to twentieth-century

nervousness and hurry, styled to modern conceptions of swift design.

More and more their appeal is visual.”28 Therefore, the abundant use of

 

26Abrams, 62 1.

27Elizabeth Hawkes, “Magazines and Their Illustrations.” in The American
Magazine. 1890-1940 (Wilmington, Delaware: The Delaware Art Museum, 1979), 27.

28James Playsted Wood, Magazines in the United States (New York: The Ronald
Press 00., 1956), 359.

 

 

12

pictorial graphics satisﬁed the modern aesthetic requirements of the new

magazine and doubtless, contributed to attracting new readers.

A. Graphic and Advertising Arts

During the early decades of the twentieth-century, technological
advances emerged in all sectors of business. Accordingly, the United
States developed into a prosperous consumer society that supported a
free enterprise system.29 Commercial arts (advertising and graphic
design) were utilized to meet the marketing and communication demands
of this growing consumer society and as the nation became more
technologically advanced, contemporary styles in advertising and graphic
arts also emerged.

“If for some, the sense of change undermined the old order and
hence appeared threatening, for others it represented challenging
possibilities in which fresh concepts of man and society could be linked
to new artistic techniques . . . combining technological functionalism
with aesthetics . . . In the eyes of its practitioners, abstract art became
unequivocally related to progress and change.”30

Inevitably technological advances determined the evolution of

products, and the advertisement styles that promoted these goods to the
American public. “Graphic designers, wielding one of the most powerful

 

 

29John Thackara, ed., Design Aﬂer Modernism: Beyond the Object (New York:
Thames & Hudson, 1988), 19. John Thackara discusses technology and innovation
brought about by mass production and mass marketing. In effect, these elements
meant bigger proﬁts for industries; In addition, John W. Cataldo discusses the larger
role graphic designers play in business and industry, and in fact, Cataldo attributes
this to an emerging prosperous consumer society (Graphic Design and Visual
Communication, John W. Cataldo [Scranton Pennsylvania: International Textbook
Company, 1966), 4): See also n31.

30Anna Moszynska, Abstract Art (New York: Thames and Hudson. 1990), 93.

 

13
instruments in advertising. are in a position to contribute to the

improvement of the ethical and aesthetic quality of mass
communication,” declared John Cataldo writing in 1966. “Graphic
design which serves advertising-sales-service functions is directly
inﬂuenced by the demands of our prospering consumer society and has
become indispensable to our free enterprise economy.”31 This art form
must utilize psychological, expressive and visual elements in order to
meet the demands expected of the advertisers. “Since all
communication—verbal and nonverbal—has the capacity to manipulate,
persuade, transform, and educate the public,” claims John Cataldo, “it
follows that graphic design is a social art and by this deﬁnition must
assume the moral and ethical responsibilities of public service.”32
During the period of the late-teens through the 1920s America’s
prosperous economy provided new expressive opportunities for graphic
and advertising artists.33 Therefore, magazines were a contemporary
mode of communicating and marketing new innovations, industries,
technologies, services and products. Early modern advertisements
served the needs of businesses by marketing both services and products.
And, after the ﬁrst decade of the twentieth-century, contemporary
advertisements indirectly aided the cause of avant-garde art styles such

as cubism as they drew upon such styles to promote the new products of

an industrialized age.

 

31Cataldo. 4.

32mm.

33Vamedoe and Gopnik, 289.

 

 

14

Artists in the graphic and advertising industries who employed the
new, more abstract styles had the opportunity to reach a wider audience
than did the modern ﬁne artist. “The art of advertising goes to the people
and receives an enormous circulation among them,” maintained Hiram
Blauvelt writing in 1925. “In this way the opportunity of advertising arts
to mold the artistic taste of our people is absolutely unlimited.”34 Due to
this mass exposure during the 19205, magazines both attracted artists
interested in experimenting with abstract styles and were inﬂuenced by
avant-garde artists who experimented with abstract forms.

During the nineteenth-century, communication and advertising
depended heavily on poster art. This was popular in both Europe and
the United States, as artists such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, who
initiated poster art as a viable visual art form, helped establish the
foundation and criteria for a creative method of communicating to the
mass public.35

While traditional and naturalistic styles in addition to poster art
were still employed on the covers of modern magazines, abstract styles
such as cubism, were used increasingly within the pages of the magazine
during the 1920s. Advertising artists borrowed the philosophy and
visual concepts of poster art. and combined them with artistic visual

techniques taken from modern art movements such as cubism, that in

 

34Hiram Blauvelt, “Advertising Art, A Foundling?,” in Printers’ Ink Monthly
(December 1925), 88.

35Varnedoe and Gopnik write, “. . . posters established . . . a style of commercial

persuasion that stressed image over text . . . and also fostered the first crossovers
between modem art and advertising” (Vamedoe and Gopnik, 236); An example of an
American designer who was profoundly inﬂuenced by modern movements such as
Cubism was Paul Rand. Philip Meggs notes, “He seized upon collage and montage as a
means to bring concepts, images, textures, and even objects into a cohesive whole”
(Meggs, 399). Rand applied his design approach to advertisements.

 

 

15

time, led to the eventual development of modern advertisements.36 Like
posters contemporary advertisements depended on abstract graphic
styles, illustrations based on principles of formalism, photographs and
avant-garde type styles to quickly attract the attention of the viewers.
Several techniques were used to accomplish this: bold colors and lines,
elements of contrast, simple geometric shapes, stylized forms, pattern,
novel compositions, to name just a few. As Roland Marchand, writing in
1985, noted, “When an advertising art director sought to create an aura
of style around a product that did not itself convey an adequate prestige
image, he was likely to turn to high art for the desired association.
Modern Art, in particular, offered the aura of both a rareﬁed aesthetic

”37

quality and an up-to-date tempo. Therefore, avant-garde applied

artists often found it necessary to abandon traditional notions of design
in order to successfully express the desired image for the advertised
product or business.

Clarence P. Homung and Fridolf Johnson attribute avant-garde
advertisement art to the progressive high art styles of the early twentieth-
century, noting:

Graphic (and advertising) arts borrowed ideas and design principles
derived from cubism, futurism and abstract art, involving the repetition
of form, color, and line: continuity of line: curves against straight edges:
warm color against cold; dark against light: and conversion of perspective
into two-dimensional planes that appear to penetrate each other. These
principles sparked a signiﬁcant dggarture from traditional formats in

layout and pictorial representation.

 

36Ibid.

37Roland Marchand, Advertising the American Dream: Making Way for Modernity,
1920-1940 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), 140.

38Clarence P. Homung and Fridolf Johnson, 200 Years of American Graphic Art
(New York: George Braziller, Inc.. 1976), 150.

 

 

16
Frank H. Young, writing in 1930, described the avant-garde

characteristics of the arts of these new advertisements noting:

A few of the outstanding characteristics of modernism in advertising (and
graphic) arts to date are extremely simple, geometric arrangements,
bizarre color schemes, decorative designs and borders created with
disregard of the traditional motifs, much use of sans-serif lettering,
words lettered perpendicularly in the advertisement and frequently
attached to the edge of an element either vertically or horizontally. . . .
Airbrush effects, slanting of the entire advertisement on the page,
rendering of illustrations to secure form and pattern rather than detail
and modeling, startling contrasts, black outlines, even in color

renderings, are additional identiﬁcations.39
In addition, Roland Marchand wrote:

Ads adopted abstract cubist forms such as zig-zagging lines,
asymmetrical layouts, futuristic borders. surrealistic j uxtapositions, and
montages of centrifugal images. The modernistic illustration insinuated
style and emotion into the product, thrusting it into association with the
smartness of novelty, fashion, and the latest mode. It infused it with the

excitement of movement and tempo (Figure 1).40

As Marchand suggests, cubism and its stylistic descendants,
futurism and cubo-futurism effectively communicated the fast-paced,
rapidly industrialized, commercial environment that emerged in an
evolving capitalist society during the 19205. Ann Uhry Abrams describes
the 1920s as “the ‘classic’ era of advertising because psychological ads
were so inﬂuential on patterns of social behavior.”"’1 For example, an
advertisement for the Franklin Automobile Company was discussed in
Printers’ Ink issue for April 2, 1925, (Figure 2). The advertisement
showed a highly detailed and accurate reproduction of Franklin’s new

 

model automobile. Behind the car, the architectural setting, although

readable, is highly abstracted and consists of “geometric planes and

 

39Young, 28.
40Marchand, 142. .

“Abrams, 625.

 

17
curves . . . that seem to move and swirl—always toward the car.” As Don

Gridley notes, the composition “brings out the things the company
wishes to show—the beauty and effectiveness of the new car—with no
distracting details.”42 The designer repeated the sweeping body lines of
the automobile in the bold lines, planes and curves of the abstract
building. The exclusion of a detailed, decorative background in favor of
an abstract representation of a building using simple, geometric forms
supported the message of the advertiser— “the year’s ’smartest open car’
designed for fashion-conscious consumers who desire action, excitement
and the open air, is now available for purchase.”"’3 In addition, the
simpliﬁed architectural form accentuates the modern, chic tastes of the
purchaser, while at the same time emphasizing the quality and high-
powered performance of the automobile. Principles of formalism
exhibited in the architecture and communicated through the
representation of the sleek automobile body were typical of how avant-
garde styles impacted advertisements during the 19205.

The language of form in enhancing the expressive message of a
design was a common element in both abstract painting and sculpture
and applied arts of graphic design and advertising. It is an important
principle of Modern Art and served as a foundation for modern graphic
and advertising designers such as Earl Horter and Dorothy Edinger,
during the early twentieth-century.“

 

42Don Gridley, “Is Modern Advertising Art Modem Enough?,” in Printers’ Ink
(April 2, 1925). 82.

4"altranklin Automobile Company Advertisement, Printers’ Ink (April 2, 1925),
82.

44Manuel Rosenberg, The Art of Advertising (New York: Harper & Brothers
Publishers, 1930), 47. An example of forrnalistic principles employed by an American

 

 

18
Formalism entails an abstract rendering of an object that

emphasizes its simple, basic shape, salient lines, curves and planes. In
effect, the simpliﬁcation of forms found in nature were representational
in origin, but were visually depicted in an abstract style. By this method
the artist conveys aspects of form that cannot be speciﬁcally delineated,
such as movement, the emotion of the subject or an emotional response
to the object depicted by the artist."’5 The anti-naturalistic
representation of a subject shifts emphasis from a perceptual to a
conceptual process of creation. This is evidenced by an advertisement
promoting The Seven Arts magazine found in Collier’s of November 1 1,
1916, (Figure 3). During the 19203, modern artists, designers, graphic
artists and illustrators moved toward conquering the language of form to
enhance the expressive message of their designs.

The graphic designer consciously attempts to synthesize many different
graphic forms with the expressive intent of communication, but since
graphic forms inevitably condition man’s sensibilities and are capable of
effecting changes in his behavior, the designer must also consider the
psychological, the physical, and optical aspects of communication in his

approach to graphic design.

 

graphic designer is Earl Horter’s design for a Steinway advertisement: A second example
is Dorothy Edinger’s design for a Robert H. Foerderer, Inc.. (Vici Kid Leather)
advertisement, 44-45.

4’5Kimberley Reynolds and Richard Seddon, Illustrated Dictionary of Art Terms
(New York: Peter Bedrick Books, 1981), 70.

46Cataldo. 65.

19
Frank H. Young attributes the success of modernistic advertising

to the artists’ knowledge of the principles of formalism, noting:

Most often the illustrator (artist) who achieves the best results in
modernistic advertising (and graphic) arts is the one whom ﬁrst acquires
a fundamental academic training. With this foundation he is equipped to
discriminate intelligently between the essentials and non-essentials of an
illustration. He can then free his picture of all that is superﬂuous and
through the use of simple line, form and pattern give more complete
expression to the same qualities and emotions than would a realistic
rendering. His academic training makes it possible for him to choose

between values and details to the advertiser’s beneﬁt.4r7

In addition, advertisers in the 19203 had to develop strategies to
attract their targeted audience. They turned to magazine artists who
utilized techniques to create a “shock effect” that alerted the viewer to
pay attention to advertisements and to the products being sold. This
“shock effect” also developed as a manifestation of the competition
between advertisers for the acquisition of a larger audience. Kirk
Varnedoe and Adam Gopnik suggest, “Advertising agents were more and
more interested by the way a diluted version of a modern style such as
cubism could serve as a mind-arresting gimmick in the presentation of
an object for sale; they urged their clients to see that a degree of
abstraction would still allow an item to be recognized, with a little

salutary effort on the part of the intrigued viewer.”48

B. The Cover
Publishers primarily used the cover design to entice the viewer to
buy the new magazine. It also served as a visual representation of the

image the magazine sought to project, and the audience it wished to

 

47Young. 16.

48Varnedoe and Gopnik, 301.

20
attract. Therefore, it was important that the cover create a positive ﬁrst

impression. Margaret Cohen writing in 1979, states “Although the cover
may or may not have had any speciﬁc reference to a feature inside the
magazine, by choice of illustration, the cover became an editorial
statement of intent through visual communication.”49
As mentioned earlier, during the transitional period magazines
such as Collier’s: The National Weekly did not use avant-garde styles on
the cover (Figure 4), instead, publishers chose traditional styles of
representation for the illustrations most prominently featured on the
cover. Images were portrayed in either a naturalistic Victorian or
decorative Art Nouveau style. One notices that these two styles
successfully project the magazine’s image, that is, Collier’s was a
magazine that American households could enjoy. “The audience that
Collier’s appealed to was the middle-class American—the broad cross-
section of men and women who came from widely different economic and
educational backgrounds.”50
In addition, as previously noted, certain early twentieth-century
magazines employed the style of poster art to create their cover
illustration. In effect, magazine covers functioned as contemporary
posters and were used to advertise the magazine. Clarence Homung and

Pridolf Johnson write: “The popularity of the poster technique is reﬂected
in many of the covers designed for turn-of-the-century magazines. Often

 

49Margaret Cohen, 'I‘elling A Magazine By Its Cover,“ in The American Magazine.
1890-1940 (Wilmington, Delaware: The Delaware Art Museum, 1979), 17.

50Alan Nourie and Barbara Nourie, eds., American Mass-Market Magazines
(Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1990). 55.

21

dominated by a single ﬁgure, the cover became a poster in miniature.”51

This design style was simple with a minimal number of elements making
up the composition. Images were still depicted naturalistically, but
shown in a simpliﬁed manner so that covers could be viewed from a
distance since they often appeared amidst other publications being sold
and displayed in bookstalls and bookstore windows. Simplicity was a
powerful appeal to the consumer.

Common themes appearing on the covers of Collier’s were images
of women (Figure 5), a woman surrounded by children, or children
shown in the midst of activity (Figure 6). These images represented the
quaint, idealistic essence of middle-class America. In addition, Collier’s
executives opted for the more acceptable and traditional styles of
representation probably thinking that abstract styles used on a cover
might offend readers, and therefore, they did not want to risk losing their
loyalty. The signiﬁcance of this discrepancy will become apparent later

in this essay.

C. The Layout

Before the advent of the new magazine, advertisers relied on the
written message of the body copy as the primary method of
communication while the advertisement’s pictorial art served a secondary
role. By the early to mid-teens, editors, advertisers and advertising

artists reversed this practice.52 They relied on pictorial and visual

 

51Homung and J ohnson, 133.

52J. C. McMichael, General Manager, Huber Hoge. Inc., notes, “. . . that the
objective of advertising is to build demand and prestige for their product (Vici Kid
Leather). A problem arises—how to market their product. He resolves this by using
much larger illustrations and shorter text than would generally have been the rule in

22

elements to convey most of the pertinent information about the product
or business. From the 1910s through the 19206, the new magazine was
characterized by creative compositions and typographical arrangements.
Clarence Homung notes, “Out of this ferment (during 1910s through the
19205) came a general departure from the vertically symmetrical division
of space in advertisement and typographic layout, an outwom tradition
ill-suited to the new technology.”53
Ann Uhry Abrams asserts:

For advertising artists, the new thrust toward awakening emotions meant
increased restrictions on stylistic innovation. As advertisers relied less
upon folksy narratives . . . the most innovative aspect of advertising art
was in the ﬁeld of layout design. Before 1920, guidebooks had advised
artists to keep layouts balanced, to avoid sharp visual angles and to
place the picture at the top of the page with the copy beneath. But by
1925, all of these regulations were considered obsolete. Composition has
gone adventuring, Printers’ Ink declared, for now designers were

permitted to have drawings. above, beneath or hidden within the copy.54

Early abstract styles that prevailed in the ﬁne arts, such as
cubism, futurism, and cubo-futurism, challenged the strict, symmetrical
and balanced arrangement of a composition in favor of creative and
expressive asymmetrical arrangements, as for example the symmetrically
balanced Mazda advertisement that appeared in The New Republic issue
for March 24, 1917, (Figure 7) versus the Mazda advertisement found in
The New Republic issue for August 25, 1919, (Figure 8). For
contemporary layout artists the cubist style of paintings reﬂected a new
means of organization among compositional elements and stylization in

represented forms. The meaning or message of a graphic design or

 

former days” (“Modemism,” J. C. McMichael. in The Art of Advertising, Manuel
Rosenberg [New York: Harper 81 Brothers Publishers, 1930], 43).

53Hornung and Johnson. 150.

“Abrams. 625.

23
advertisement depends on the artful use of the elements of design: the

headline and body copy; images or photographs; and the compositional
layout of the entire page. Together, these contribute to the visual
expression and overall meaning of a graphic advertisement.
Asymmetrical compositions (see Figure 8) exempliﬁed a sense of
movement among the units of the composition and, in addition, such
asymmetrical layouts helped direct the viewer’s eye around the page.
Douglas McMurtrie, writing in 1930, notes, “It goes without saying that
the layout of the future will be dynamic rather than static. A balanced
composition (see Figure 7) will become more and more rare and layouts
in which the sense of movement is predominant will appear more and

”55 The active compositions seen in the modern

more frequently.
magazine reﬂect the high-energy, fast-paced momentum of the American
society that was emerging in the 1920s. What was more important,
advertising artists working abstractly, often manipulated the shapes and
the sizes of page elements, so as to emphasize some of the compositional
units more than others. Asymmetrical layouts could function the same
as contemporary art styles by suggesting qualities like style and emotion
about a product.56

In addition, the placement of headlines was no longer limited to the
center of the page, but could be placed randomly within the

 

55Douglas C. McMurtrie, “The Future of Advertising Composition,” in Printers'
Ink (April, 1930). 90.

56“As a student of psychology he (the layout artist) must understand how to
create impressions and to effect reactions of both eye and mind” (Rosenberg, 94); In
addition Rosenberg writes, “Balance, or rather lack of it, is another modernistic effect.
The changing of the proportions of ﬁgures, or parts of them, so as to concentrate
attention on one part of the composition, or to contrast an unwieldy ﬁgure presented in
small space with a small one presented in large space, has shock value” (Ibid., 43).

7A
advertisement’s composition. In fact, headlines and body copy could be

arranged to conform to a variety of shapes. An example of an interesting
and effective advertisement composition is found in The New Republic
issue for August 25, 1917 , (Figure 8). This advertisement for Mazda
exempliﬁes the visual excitement of creative and dynamic page
arrangements. While both advertisements (Figure 7 and Figure 8) retain
a heavy emphasis on text, the block of body copy is found in the upper
right corner of the composition in Figure 8. Directly below the body copy
is a graphic image of the product, an incandescent lamp. Below the
graphic image is the bold Mazda logo and accompanying sub-title. The
entire composition is offset slightly from the center axis of the page. A
generous white space surrounds and balances the compositional
elements, accentuating the practical, innovative qualities of the Mazda
incandescent lamps7

The Mazda advertisement appearing in The New Republic issue for
February 24, 1917 , (Figure 9) demonstrates the progressive use of
modern asymmetrical layouts and the effectiveness of negative space.
In this advertisement the negative, or “white space,” is just as critical to
the success of the advertisement as are the compositional units that
make up the layout of the page. Negative space, created intentionally
throughout the layout, results in bold, uncluttered compositions.

Magazine artists during the late-teens through the 1920s realized that

 

57The company’s technologically progressive ideas on lighting are emphasized by
the dominating use of white space (negative space) in the composition. “Tire selection
of background, beyond being a matter of taste and good judgment on the part of the
artist, is often a matter of strategy. He wishes to place his sales idea in a compelling
light, and to dominate the page, if he is using part space. Here he would do well to
consider the value of using the paper as background. In a restricted area it gives the
feeling of greater space . . ." (Ibid., 49). In the Mazda advertisements (Figures 8 8r 9) the
white space suggests the brilliant, luminous quality of the innovative incandescent

lamp.

25
the use of fewer elements in the composition of a page, often resulted in

more visually focused, eye-catching advertisements.

11 Typography

The designers employed by these modern mass-produced
publications realized that typography was an essential element in a
design composition. As a result, innovative and creative typefaces were
devised that reﬂected these modern times (Figure 10). Bodoni, a thick,
bold-faced type style “. . . has become the Caslon of the modern
movement,” writes L. B. Siegfried, “Cooper Bold, a type face which, for all
its limitations, is almost the only genuinely original contribution that

”58 No longer was

America has made to typography in these latter years.
the traditional serif typeface the only style used. At the turn of the
century, designers were experimenting with bold, clean sans-serif type
that complimented avant-garde styles used in pictorial artwork (Figure
1 1).

While type was still arranged in a typical horizontal format during
the 1920s, vertical and diagonal conﬁgurations were also being
explored.59 The typeface, combined with illustrations and borders,
presented artists with new areas for experimentation. As artists
endeavored to create dynamic page layouts, they were also developing

new typography styles. “What was needed was a typographic format

sympathetic to machine composition, and to complement it, new type

 

58L. B. Siegfried, “Modernism Emerges Full-Fledged,” in Advertising and Selling
(February 8, 1928), 25.

59“. . . if the picture is oblong, square, oval, triangular, or circular in design, he
(the advertising artist) must guide his lettering lines accordingly and in keeping with the
rest of the layout” (Rosenberg. 100).

26
forms. German designers were the leaders in the ’new typography,’
which was essentially functional and, with asymmetrical arrangement of
copy blocks and display lines . . . .”60

Writing in 1966, John Cataldo states, “Type has a special
interpretive function, and one of the designer’s responsibilities is to
match the ﬁnal graphic form with what the author intended his text to
say. He selects, discards, suspends judgment, and chooses again in a
continual personal struggle to achieve an equilibrium between his
aesthetic values and the pragmatic literary function of the text.”61
In short, after the 1920s visual and artistic elements of the modern
mass-produced magazine continued to evolve, paralleling the activity
occurring in modern ﬁne arts. Nevertheless, these artists during the
1920s and later continued to push one another in developing modern
artistic innovations. For this reason, in 1957 , Hank Mott wrote, “The
appearance of the magazine changed greatly in the latter thirties. There
was much more color in the illustrations, the printing of them was ’bled’
off the edges of the pages, there was much of the new angled make-up,
and illustrators like Gluyas Williams took the pencil and brush from the
old-timers. Covers by Ben Jorj Harris, Robert 0. Reid, Alan Foster, and

others were in this new mood and style.”62

x

60Homung and Johnson, 150.
61Cataldo, 23.

62Frank Luther Mott, A History ofAmerican Magazines, 1895-1 905, vol.IV
(Cambridge, Massachusettes: Harvard University Press, 1957), 474.

27
III. Advertising Art in Collier’s The National Weekly Magazine

Peter Fenton Collier, an Irish immigrant, founded Collier’s: The
National Weekly magazine on April 28, 1888. Initially, Collier’s title was
Collier’s: Once A Week, however, through the decades the name of the
magazine was modiﬁed to reﬂect its evolving image. Collier was
successful in accomplishing his early mission of providing “ﬁction, fact.
sensation, wit, humor and news,” which the new magazine so boldly
proclaimed on its cover. In 1895, the magazine became known as
Collier’s Weekly: An Illustrated Journal, and three years later Collier’s son
Robert became its publisher. It was Robert who was largely responsible
for furthering Collier’s popularity in addition to adopting the subtitle The
National Weekly.63

Collier’s reported news so that Americans were kept informed of
the latest issues occurring locally and internationally. During World War
I and II, Collier’s reported on the happenings and events taking place
within the continents of Europe, Asia, and Africa. People relied on its
accurate news coverage in addition to illustrations and photographs,
which were all used as a visual testament to the many military
campaigns occurring abroad.64

Collier’s also served as a popular entertainment magazine,
combining both ﬁction and illustrations in the form of excerpts from
popular novels, short stories by authors such as H. G. Wells, poetry and
a variety of puzzles and witty exercises. Writing in 1990, Alan and

Barbara Nourie note, “In the early years as Collier’s: An Illustrated

 

63Nourie and Nourie, 53.

64“Mott, 476.

28
Jow'nal, the publication included ﬁction and humor with an emphasis on
news and illustration. As Collier’s grew, there was a decided
improvement in all aspects of its makeup. Collier's soon became known
for its color illustrations and memorable writings, and even poetry was

included in its pages."65

A. 1905-1914

The 1905 issues of Collier’s were chosen as the starting point for
this investigation so that familiarization of the stylistic traits and
contents of the magazine could be understood. The discoveries that are
noted in this analysis are arranged chronologically corresponding to their
appearance in Collier’s. This made it easier to assess the impact that
modernism had on the graphic layout and advertisements in Collier’s.
After careful analysis of each issue through the year 1930, I became
aware of interesting and notable trends that will be discussed in greater
depth later in this study. Meanwhile, particular attention was given to
the many advertisements and illustrations seen throughout the pages of
the magazine, which forms the central focus of this investigation.

During the years 1905- 1914, the most notable features
contributing to the dynamic contents of Collier's: The National Weekly
were the numerous black-and-white illustrations, drawings and graphics
found throughout its pages. Advertisements for a variety of different
products were found throughout the magazine.

Full-page advertisements were not common in Collier’s during
the period 1905-1914. Instead, publishers and advertisers opted for

advertisements that could be placed on the same page as an article, at

 

65Nourie and Nourie, 54.

 

29
the end of a story, or within the vertical columns of the classified section

in the back of the magazine. Although the advertisements were small,
they were still compelling enough to captivate the reader’s attention.

The occasional full-page advertisement such as The House of
Kuppenheirner promotion found in the Collier’s issue for May 7, 1910,
was useful to the magazine‘s layout artist in marking the end of one
section and the beginning of another. However, by the end of the 19203,
full-page and even double-page advertisements became a common
characteristic in forming the composition of Collier’s: The National
Weekly.

Illustrations utilized in advertisements, articles and short stories
varied in technique from simple line drawings making use of curvilinear
devices, to a painterly, soft and poetic. watercolor technique. However,
no matter what medium the artist chose, the result was a highly detailed
and naturalistic illustration.

Black-and-white photographs were the only form of photography
available to the artists at Collier’s during this period. Yet fewer
photographs appear in advertisements than in the magazine's short
stories or articles. If several photographs were used in these sections,
the artist sometimes employed the technique of overlapping to create a
sense of visual excitement in the layout. In Collier’s from 1905-1914 the
practice of overlapping photographs was not utilized as frequently in the
advertisements as it was in pictorial images accompanying stories.

During this time, the magazine's graphic and advertising artists
used illustrations in short stories and articles to serve primarily as a
visual contrast to writings. More importantly, the illustration's small size

suggests that it was not meant to detract from the author’s message, but

 

30
instead used to create a sense of harmony with it, and within the overall

composition. The majority of illustrations in Collier’s from 1905- 1914
seen in its writings and advertisements and on its cover share the same
artistic style. The magazine executives and artists conceived a Victorian
aura throughout the magazine and chose to portray this feeling with
visual images—a depiction of reﬁnement and elegance was expressed on
almost every page including the cover, by a preponderance of curvilinear
elements. It would appear that editors, advertisers and artists felt that
the sumptuous lines suited the taste of the audience the publishers
sought to attract. This is especially noticeable in Collier’s cover
illustrations that are usually representations of women dressed lavishly,
and yet conservatively, in a manner sure to catch the eye of an individual
passing by the newsstand.

Unlike the cover, which almost always depicted women, the
advertisements in Collier’s from 1905- 1914, were generally directed to a
male audience. Collier’s targeted and attracted male consumers utilizmg
several methods, one of which was luring them with enticing
advertisements. Male-oriented products such as Bull Dog Model B
Suspenders, Colgate’s Shaving Stick, Mullins Steel Boats, Adler’s
Collegian Clothes and The Florsheim Shoe were typical products
advertised in the Collier’s issue for April 13, 1907. In the Collier's issue
for May 7, 1910, small advertisements promoting male products
frequently appeared throughout the pages of the magazine. These
include Prince Tobacco (R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Co.), Durham-Duplex

Razor and Reis Underwear advertisements.66 The only advertisement

 

66Collier’s: The National Weekly, (October 12, 1912), 30-3 1. Numerous
advertisements appear aimed a the male audience. For example United States

31

remotely aimed at the female audience was a Seeger Refrigerator Co.
advertisement.67 Female-oriented products were less frequently
advertised than male-oriented products in magazines such as Collier’s
perhaps because editors and advertisers chose to address the needs of
the wage earner.68 Indeed, the male reader was commonly the
breadwinner of the family and the person who held the ultimate
purchasing decision. But the fact was women actually purchased the
products while men were at work.69 Even though men were perceived as
making the buying decision, women were actually making the point—of—

purchase decision.70

 

Cartridge Co., Hamilton Watch. Stein-Bloch Men's Clothier, Faultless men's shirts.
pajamas and night shirts. and Colt Revolver (Colt Patent Fire Arms Mfg. Co.). None of
these advertisements used contemporary art styles; however, the pictorial images were
equal or greater in size and proportion to the body copy. In effect the pictures helped
identify and stress qualities of the product being marketed.

67Ibid., 32-33. Most of the advertisements found on these two pages were
directed at a female audience. For example The Quaker Oats Company (Puﬁed Wheat &
Puffed Rice), Kalamazoo Stove Co., Shur-on (eyeglass and spectacle mountings),
Holstein—Milk, Loftis Bros., & Co. (diamond cutters), Old Dutch Cleanser and Borden
Condensed Milk Co. Except for the pictorial illustration in the Old Dutch Cleanser
advertisement the body copy was the predominate element in the layout of each
advertisement. In addition the drawings utilized in these advertisements were
traditional in style and naturalistic in representation.

68“ . . . the more modern magazine . . . includes serious ideas as well as
amusement (for men). Furthermore. more American men have become sophisticated,
better educated. and more widely traveled than ever before, and demand more from
their magazines" (Understanding Magazines. Roland E. Wolseley [Ames, Iowa: The Iowa
State University Press, 1965]. 283).

69This conclusion is based on several advertisements for The Delineator
magazine which stressed the novel idea that advertisers need to realize that women
were actually the “purchasing agents”of American homes (see Figures 16 and 17).
However. this was evidently a foreign thought during this period. because
advertisements continued to address the sole needs of a male audience. Observations
such as these point to the social conditions of the United States which, therefore,
rrrisdirected the marketing of products through the eyes of men when women were
actually making the majority of the purchasing decisions: See also n.70 and n.77.

70"Women, they say, spend eighty—five cents of every retail dollar expended in
the United States. They are the purchasing agents for the American family. Their
buying includes not only their own intimate possessions. and not only the equipment
and decorations for the home, but also in great measure includes automobiles.

 

32
In addition to the advertisements, a majority of the articles found

in Collier’s pertained to current events, ﬁnancial news and world events.
which were also directed to its male readers. On the other hand,
excerpts from novels and short stories that were always included in
Collier’s were evidently written for a female audience. These short stories
were often love stories with sentimental illustrations that resemble
contemporary romance novels.71

A short article entitled Art with the Appeal of a Bullﬁght (Figure 12)
appeared in the Collier’s issue for February 15, 1913. Between 1905 and
1913 this was the ﬁrst article detected that was entirely dedicated to the

 

subject of Modern Art. The author discussed the upcoming opening of
the eagerly awaited I ntemational Exhibition of Modern Ant held in New
York City, and the turmoil the works of Modern Art created among the
critics who were allowed a sneak preview. American art critics, after
viewing works such as Brancusi’s Portrait Bust, argued among
themselves and produced an excitement that had not been felt nor seen
in the art ﬁeld in a long time. “The leading art insurgents of half a dozen

countries were represented in the exhibition, much work by men of such

 

undeniable attainments as Rodin and Monet was shown, but some more
puzzling productions, are the stimulators of controversy.”72 The article
suggests that the art critics who attended this preview had differing

 

haberdashery, drugs, insurance, travel. tools. and a score of classes of merchandise
that are generally regarded as masculine” (“The Appeal To The Eternal Feminine,”
Dorothy Cocks, in The Art of Advertising, Manuel Rosenberg [New York: Harper &
Brothers Publishers, 1930], 171): In addition, “Much of the high standard of living today
is due to the buying acumen of the American woman. She is an open-minded, even a
broad-minded buyer, eager for facts, ambitious to make her life and the family life more
beautiful and gracious” (Rosenberg, 171).

71Nourie and Nourie. 55.

72“Art with the Appeal of a Bullfight.” in Collier's: The National Weekly
(February 15, 1913), 10.

 

33
opinions on cubism and the other avant-garde styles represented, which

were premiering ofﬁcially for the ﬁrst time in the United States (see
Figure 12). Some critics praised these new art styles because they
produced agitation in a rather stagnate art era, whereas others abhorred
that such works were allowed to be shown, and labeled them a “curse”
among other acclaimed works of art.73

This short article, which appeared in the Collier’s issue for
February 15, 1913, was the ﬁrst indication of the ridicule that cubism
and other Modern Art styles would have to overcome, not only among the
art critics in the United States, but with the public in general. What
European artists had discovered was far from what the audience in the
United States had come to expect as beautiful art. From the response to
this exhibition, it was evident that it would take time for most Americans
to accept cubism and other Modern artistic styles.

In 1914, another exhibition of Modern Art was held on the top ﬂoor
of a New York loft building, which would again test the connoisseurship
abilities of the American art critics. This New York loft building was
transposed into a gallery featuring 108 canvases. An article that
appeared in the Collier’s edition for January 31, 1914, entitled An
Exhibition by the Unexhibited (Figure 13), discussed the works whose
collective trait was not being selected for an upcoming exhibition
sponsored by the National Academy of Design. Once the American
artists found out that their works would not be displayed in the show,
they formed their own exhibition that probably rivaled the exhibition
organized by the National Academy of Design.

 

731bid.

 

34
“Though not a show of secessionists, (Academy juries are not in the

habit of ‘accepting’ futurist and cubist puzzles), it included much work
that bespoke the inﬂuence of art insurgency; and the work of women
artists was shown in much larger proportion than at the Academy.”4
The art works also utilized abstract formalist elements that were so
foreign to American tastes.

The establishment of the Exhibition by the Unexhibited attests once
again to the hurdles which American Modernists had to overcome in
order to gain acceptance. However, this did not stop the American artist
from experimenting and incorporating progressive abstract styles into his
or her own art work. The 108 canvases displayed at the Exhibition by the
Unexhibited were proof enough that American twentieth-century artists
would not allow the “professional art critics” to prohibit and dictate their
creative talents, and that the eventual insurgence of European Modern
Art styles such as cubism would eventually gain the acceptance and
respect they deserved.

A few of the artists whose works appeared in the Exhibition by the
Unexhibited include E. V. Cockcroft’s Arrangement with Figure, Orlando
Rouland’s Plaza Reﬂections, Martha Walter's Mom the Beach and John F.
Parker’s Retreat to Valley Forge. These artists effectively translated
avant-garde styles into typical compositions that were more familiar and
acceptable to the American public. However, a majority of the general
audience was not ready for the change from the expected naturalistic
approach of a subject to a more subjective, imaginative and abstract

approach. This acceptance would eventually come at a later time.

 

747m Exhibition by the Unexhibited.” in Collier’s: The National Weekly (January
31.1914). 15.

 

 

B. 1915-1919

In 1915, a majority of the advertisements in Collier’s began
utilizing abstract art styles like Art Nouveau as a means of illustrating
the product. This is interesting because the adoption of such styles in
the art of advertisements occurred twenty to thirty years after their
emergence in the high arts of painting and sculpture. The applied
artists, in addition to advertisers and magazine executives, were much
slower in adopting contemporary styles as a means of illustrating a
product.75

These decorative styles like Art Nouveau were selectively used for
certain types of products, exotic products in which the contemporary
styles accentuate this quality in a rather elementary or superficial
manner. For example, an advertisement for Mecca cigarettes, which
appeared in the Collier’s edition for February 6. 1915. is one of the ﬁrst
advertisements recognized in this study that relied on the decorative
qualities of Art Nouveau to communicate the chic status of smoking
exotic, Turkish blend cigarettes (Figure 14). The Lord & Thomas
advertising ﬁrm located in New York City designed and created the
marketing campaign for Mecca cigarettes, and Frank W. Harwood was
the advertising manager responsible for its success. These

advertisements appeared in newspapers, magazines such as Collier’s,

 

75Perhaps a reason for this delay in avant-garde style usage in American
advertisements is “The average European reader is more cultured, more sophisticated.
The average European advertisement is less eﬂ‘icient—hardly more than name publicity
by our standards. The average American reader is less sophisticated—demands more
realism in his art. more why and wherefore in the copy" (“European Advertising Art—In
Europe and in America." by Aesop Glim in Printers’ Ink [March 19, 1931], 41).

 

36
billboards, posters and a variety of other forms of media.76 Exposure to
the public, in whatever form, was a key element in the campaign
program promoting Mecca cigarettes.

The Mecca cigarette advertisement was comprised of a double-page
spread. Two images representing men in Turkish costume smoking
cigarettes are placed on opposite sides of the pages, serving to hold the
composition together. The headline. logo, and body copy are placed in
the center of the composition, making some words illegible. Obviously,
the artist was unaware of the problems incurred when placing pictorial
images and typography in the “gutter" region of a magazine or book. On
the other hand. the Mecca advertisement is an excellent example of the
experimentation and initial development of magazine page layouts. which
was probably due in part, to the inﬂuence of modern compositional
layouts developing concurrently in painting. In addition, the designer for
the advertisement also employed the technique of overlapping units in
the composition, and in doing so. successfully creates an illusion of
depth.

In the Collier’s edition for April 24, 1915, Mecca cigarettes were
again advertised: however, editors. advertisers and artists, this time.
chose a single page layout (Figure 15). The same units used in the
earlier advertisement are employed once again. However, there are a few
additions to the composition. The artist has added two decorative lines
in the shape of an oval, which enhance the exotic Turkish quality of the

overall composition. The second modiﬁcation of the earlier Mecca

 

76The Standard Advertising Register (Wilkes-Barre. Pennsylvania: The National
Register Publishing Company. Inc.. 1925), 134.

 

37
advertisement is the heightened practice of overlapping the graphic units

such as the image and text within the composition. The Mecca cigarette
box overlaps the oval, the head of the Turk overlaps the oval, and the
Mecca logo partially overlaps the head of the Turk. Each element
overlaps another creating a sense of unity and an aesthetically pleasing
compositional arrangement.

The product identiﬁcation for Mecca cigarettes is the head of a man
wearing a Turkish turban, smoking a cigarette. This turban serves as an
important decorative device in the composition, while at the same time
attracting the viewer’s eyes. The artist has geometrically divided the
fabric of the turban into a series of squares, circles and lines. The
execution of this simple, stylistic elegance is avant-garde in character—
breaking down a form into simple shapes. In 1915, the artists who
designed the Mecca advertisements chose ﬂat colors to ﬁll—in geometric
areas of the turban and turban pendent. creating a ﬂat, abstract and
jewel—like effect. This is in contrast to the traditional method of using
light and shade (Chiaroscuro) to create three-dimensional form. In
addition to the stunning pattern of the turban, the headdress is further
enhanced by a jeweled broach, formed by a geometric pattern of simple
circles and “pear” shapes.

The typographical style of the Mecca logo resembles the stylistic
characteristics of Art Nouveau. The letters are rounded and curved. as if
they were made up of a series of arcs or organic shapes. In addition to
the pictorial elements of the composition that have already been
discussed, the curvilinear feature of the logo. also symbolizes the Near
Eastern image of the Turkish peoples. The curves of the letter forms

repeat the curves of the turban folds, the pin, the stylized curves of the

 

38
face and the snake-like stream of smoke. It is evident that the designer

for Mecca cigarette advertisements believes that the illustration, along
with typography and layout could serve as a means of decoration.
Together, the elements complement each other, forming a balanced,
aesthetically pleasing, exotic advertisement.

By employing avant-garde art styles such as those referenced in
both Mecca advertisements from Collier’s, designers helped the consumer
recall the product and its name. The abstract styles employed in the
advertisement successfully communicated a unique image for the Mecca
brand of cigarettes, while enticing the viewer to experience the exotic
ﬂavor of their Turkish blend.

Foremost in the minds of these graphic artists was the audience to
which the product and its design addressed. This factor often dictates
the art style utilized in the advertisement. For example, the abstract
styles employed in both Mecca advertisements were carefully selected to
reach a designated audience—one that is worldly, glamorous,
adventurous, modern and free-thinking. In order to seize the viewer’s
attention, the artist relied on the abstract and graphic forms of the high
art style of Art Nouveau for appealing, decorative and creative
advertisements.

Even though abstract styles were used by applied artists during
1915-1919, non-modem styles still retained popularity among
advertisers and commercial artists. For instance, a Prudential Insurance
Company of America advertisement appeared in the Collier's issue for
May 19, 1917. This was a full page, highly detailed and naturalistic
illustration depicting the Prudential rock and the United States naval
ﬂeet. The advertiser was suggesting that if Prudential can protect the

39

nation's naval defense organization than it can protect your home. The
illustration dominates the page layout while successfully conveying the
message of Prudential. Headlines and sub—headings in addition to the
company name are the only texts included in the composition, the
burden of effectively communicating the message of the advertiser, relies
on the talents of the advertising artist and the product of his or her
creativity. Other advertisements appearing in this Collier’s issue that do
not employ avant-garde art styles include Calmers Underwear (men),
San-Tox Shaving Lotion and After—Shave tale (men), San-Tox Cold Cream
(women). Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., Gillette Safety Razor Co., and the
American Safety Razor Company to name a few. In addition numerous
automobile and automotive product advertisements were common in the
Collier’s issue for May 19, 1917 .

During the year 1919 an interesting phenomenon occurred in the
American advertising industry—the initial recognition that women were
an important commercial factor in the modern world.77 Evidence of this
trend is suggested by two advertisements in The New Republic issues of
March 8, 1919, (Figure 16) and March 29. 1919, (Figure 17). The
advertisements announced the usefulness of the The Delineator magazine
for those who sought to sell their products to the American public. More
importantly, the advertisements stated that advertisers should
acknowledge women as a commercial factor in the modern world and,

furthermore, that women should be recognized as the modern household

 

77The New Republic (March 8, 1919). 194 and The New Republic (March 29,
1919), 19. are the first advertisements that I detected. which descibe women as
“purchasing agents" of American homes. The advertisement stated advertisers need to
realize the role that women play in determining the commercial factor of a modern
world. It is also interesting that these two advertisements were published the year
before women were granted their right to vote. The years 1919 and 1920 were
important to women both politically and socially; See also n68. n.69 and n. 70.

 

4o
purchaser. In short, “nearly every household necessity that women did
not purchase direct, she inﬂuenced the choice of, and therefore women

should be known as ‘purchasing agents."’78

C. 1920-1927

Between the years 1920 and 1927, the weekly issues of Collier’s
showed an increase in the use of superﬁcial, geometric abstraction in the
illustrations used in short stories. Graphic artists achieved this look by
relying on the basic principles of formalism—breaking up forms, while
combining geometric planes to create structural forms. Images became
more abstracted as artists gradually simpliﬁed their compositions, and
depended more and more on line, pattern and color to organize their
layouts. Artists were beginning to think about the essence of an image,
the critical structural components that were essential to the identity and
form of the image. These forms were then stylized and their shapes
manipulated so that the elementary features were the main source of
visual identiﬁcation. It was during the years 1920- 1927 that the
development of the foundation of abstraction in Collier’s became
noticeable.

One notable example is the illustration for a short story entitled
Where Have I Heard That Time Before? found in the Collier's edition for
July 3, 1926, (Figure 18). The characters illustrated display a
caricature-like quality that relies primarily on the expressive use of
pattern. lines and shapes to create the geometric shape of the ﬁgures’

bodies.

 

78mm.

 

 

41

The subject of the writing, Jazz music, poses another intriguing
relationship with that of the abstract style used in the story's pictorial
imagery. Jazz, during this time, was raising eyebrows in the music
industry, just as avant-garde art styles like cubism were raising
eyebrows in the ﬁeld of art. One can assume that the chosen abstract
pictorial style was an insightful, conscious decision of the artist and
publisher. Furthermore, jazz and cubism were both innovations that had
to overcome barriers in their respective ﬁelds. Only by seeing these two
“eyebrow raising" innovations were people able to formulate for
themselves their individual aesthetic tastes, and decide whether jazz, and
a progressive abstract style such as cubism. would be acceptable for an
advanced American society.

A graphic and typographic game know as Nameographs was also
introduced to Collier’s between the years 1920-1927 (Figure 19). These
were pictorial images formed by arranging and distorting the shape of
words and the letters that compose them. The shapes of the individual
letters were exaggerated, so that the meaning of the word could be
expressed in both a written and pictorial manner. These pictorial images
were not naturalistic, but rather abstract, relying heavily on the viewer’s
imagination to ﬁll in the gaps. Doubtless, the introduction of this word
and picture game was devised in part as a result of the growing use of
abstracted formal elements such as line, shape and pattern. The
introduction of exercises such as Nameographs, in addition to abstract
pictorial styles suggest that visual communication artists were beginning
to conquer the tools of their trade, just as painters and sculptors were

doing in this period.

 

42
During the years 1920-1927. in contrast to those abstracted

images already discussed numerous “non-formalistic” imagery was also
evident in Collier’s magazine. Examples include International Harvester
Co., Oldsmobile, Western Electric. Twinplex Sales Co., Williams Shaving
Cream, Palmolive Shaving Cream and Nicholson File Company

advertisements.

D. 1928

In the year 1928, the male audience was still the target of
advertisements in magazines such as Collier’s. However, there was a
change in the pictorial style of these promotions. Unlike the
fundamental abstract style seen in the 1927 issues of Collier’s, in 1928
there was an increase in the use of highly abstract avant—garde styles
such as cubism, that made the compositions appear more complex and
sophisticated, adapting stylistic features to suit a particular product. In
addition, the increase of fragmented and multi—faceted images aided the
artist in expressing intangible qualities about a product. The abstract
representation of various weather elements such as rain, wind, and
sunshine: and the abstract depiction of light. sound and movement,
heightened the complexity of a composition. Some advertising artists
created montage illustrations that were a formation of several images
grouped together in a single composition. The following examples typify
the contemporary aspect of advertisements and the products being sold,
that could be found in the 1928 editions of Collier’s.

The ﬁrst example appeared in an advertisement in the Collier’s
issue for May 12, 1928, that promoted Knox Hats, which were
manufactured by the Knox Hat Company of New York (Figure 20). The

 

43
advertising ﬁrm responsible for these advertisements was Pedlar & Ryan,

Inc., New York, and H. C. Hoagland was the advertising manager.79

In Collier’s the Knox Hat advertisement was a double—page spread
with two large illustrations. The drawings exemplify common
characteristics of a cubist montage, combining everyday scenes into a
single fragmented and multi-faceted pictorial image.

The artist has taken an everyday scene and personiﬁed climatic
elements. Wind and rain dominate the scene in the illustration on the
left. Rain, depicted as diagonal lines, divides the composition, as well as
indicates motion. The picture is separated further by numerous
umbrellas whose shapes are broken down into shifting triangular planes.
Rays of light, emitted from the gleaming sun, complicate the composition
and heighten the abstract quality of the picture in the illustration on the
right. The rays of light break-up the pictorial images as well as the space
surrounding them. The arrangement of the umbrellas in the opposite
illustration. serves a similar function as the hats in the drawing on the
right. In the picture, the oval tops of the many Knox Hats transforms
into abstract elements of design. creating an illusion of a rapidly
juxtaposed foreground and background. In both of these modem-day
illustrations, it is evident that by breaking up the scenes in this manner
the artist hoped to evoke a response from the viewer—a sense of
enthusiasm and excitement concerning the practicality of wearing a Knox
Hat in any weather condition, in addition to its conservative fashionable

qualities.

 

79The Standard Advertising Register (Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania: The National
Register Publishing Company, Inc.. 1929). 263.

 

44
As mentioned earlier. avant-garde advertising artists abstracted

forms to convey the emotional effects of sunlight, wind and various forms
of precipitation, in addition to communicating both the tangible and
intangible qualities of the product. The artist is able to conﬁdently
express these effects by using abstract art styles such as cubism,
futurism and cube-futurism, to create sophisticated montage
compositions. This practice increased the opportunity for modemists to
experiment with abstract forms.

The Gillette Safety Razor Company was another organization that
incorporated progressive modernistic styles in the creation of its
contemporary advertisements. An example is found in the Collier’s
edition for June 30, 1928, (Figure 21). The product is Gillette razor
blades; razor blades that are manufactured for a clean, comfortable
shave. In 1928, the New York city advertising ﬁrm Batten, Barton,
Durstine & Osborn, Inc., was hired to engineer the Gillette marketing
campaign. E. D. Copeland served as Gillette’s advertising manager, and
he oversaw an annual advertising budget of $250.000—500,000.
Advertisements promoting Gillette razor blades and other Gillette
products appeared in magazines such as Collier’s, newspapers, trade
papers. direct mailers and window displays.80 In contrast to other
businesses during the late 1920s, it would appear that the large budget
allocated for promotion, attests to Gillette's view on the importance of
advertising.

In the advertisement’s body copy, Gillette publicized the

advancements it had made in razor blade manufacturing. Earlier, the

 

80lbid.. 115.

 

45
daily output of razor blades was less than a hundred. As of 1928,
Gillette asserts that each day the company now makes over two million
razor blades. More importantly. these blades were made by delicate
machines that perfectly honed each razor blade for a comfortable smooth
shave.81
Gillette addressed the problems of man, and believed that razor

82 Each

blades could help alleviate the rigor induced by modern society.
day one faces a unique set of challenges. However, day after day, Gillette
razor blades can be depended on to give a clean comfortable shave.
Time, temperature, humidity, hard or soft water, and a heavy beard are
all conditions that determine the razor‘s excellence.83
In order to communicate these qualities. the artist for the
advertisement chose to create a design and advertisement using the
modern technique of cubist inspired montage. The designer apparently
chose this more sophisticated style because the cubist montage provided
an opportunity for the artist to convey the emotional effects men felt each
day as they encountered the conditions already mentioned. By grouping
the images and representing them in an animated, vigorous, and vibrant
manner, the artist accentuates the stress that challenge men daily, and
that really “drives home the point” that Gillette razor blades can help
men survive most adversities. Most likely, if the artist had chosen a

“static” and illusionistic composition, the effectiveness of the

advertisement would have been considerably diminished.

 

81The Gillette Safety Razor Company Advertisement, Collier‘s: The National
Weekly (June 30, 1928). 3.

82mm.

83mm.

 

45
Weather effects, in addition to sound, are intangible qualities that

are portrayed in the illustration. If the artist had based the depiction of
the alarm clock solely on the principles of analytical cubism—ﬂat two-
dimensional quality, an image represented by a faceted arrangement of
geometric planes, and multiple points of view—the illustration would not
have been as effective in expressing the rigor of contemporary America.
Overlapping and fragmenting the alarm clock clearly expresses the high-
pitch ring of the alarm, which is just one of the stress-induced factors
portrayed in this cubist montage.

A second Gillette advertisement seen in the Collier’s issue of
October 13, 1928, depends on avant-garde art styles like cubism to
abstractly represent conditions such as light and time (Figure 22). The
illustration displays various shaving tools such as a razor, lather brush.
the storage box for the razor and a man’s wristwatch. Each of these
items is located on a glass ledge found above the bathroom sink. The
background is decorated using bathroom tiles that resemble a
checkerboard pattern. The artist for the Gillette advertisement utilized
reﬂections, shadows and highlights to break up the form of the images
and the surrounding space. Shadows and reﬂections appear as
geometric forms, arranged among the other shaving items included in the
composition. One may assume that the artist was interested in the play
of light, while using light and its effects to help create a pictorial illusion
of space and depth, without compromising the identity of the product.

Western Electric announced the availability of a new loudspeaker
that could be connected to the radio for an “all-around” quality. This
advertisement appeared in the Collier’s issue for October 13, 1928,
(Figure 23). The new loudspeaker was an innovative product that

47
enhanced the sound people heard. The advertising ﬁrm hired to create

advertisements for Western Electric’s (Graybar Electric Company) was a
New York City ﬁrm known as Newell-Emmett Co. Herbert Metz was the
General Advertising and Sales Promotion Manager for Western Electric.
It was his duty to manage an annual budget of $100,000-250,000.
Advertisements such as the one seen in Collier’s were found in other
magazines, newspapers. trade papers, direct mailers, novelties,
catalogues and window displays.84

The advertisement has two illustrations at the top of the page, and
once again. the drawings occupy a majority of the layout space although
text is still a prominent feature. In each of the illustrations, the artist
attempts to create a visual image of sound. Similar to the Gillette
advertisement (Figure 21), the more the artist used cubist techniques to
represent a non-verbal message the higher the degree of abstraction in
the statement. This is achieved by depicting sound waves entering the
microphone and exiting through the loudspeaker. The strength of the
sound waves is characterized by strong diagonal lines that break-up
pictorial forms and the surrounding space, which happened to be in the
path of the sound waves.

Within the illustrations, typography was used to suggest the
direction and strength of the sound waves emitted from the speaker
system. The artist chose a slanted sans-serif typeface to suggest speed.
The strength of the sound was implied by tapering the size of the letters
for the words GOING and COMHVG. Even the sans-serif typeface used in

the Western Electric logo suggests the galvanizing image of an electronic

 

84The Standard Advertising Register (1929), 68.

48
company, and the power of its technologn The inclusion of typography

within an illustration was a stylistic element, initially made popular by
cubist collage, and commercial artists probably sensed that it would also
be effective in advertisements to symbolize written images of reality.
Words can serve as individual expressions like the Nameographs (Figure
19) that were discussed earlier. In this example, words symbolize the
strength and crisp quality of sounds—sounds that are transmitted
through the microphone and are emitted more strongly and more loudly,
because of the all-around quality of the Western Electric loudspeaker.

An advertisement for Thorens Automatic Lighters is another
example of the effective use of abstract faceted styles such as cubism in
portraying the function and chic image of the Thorens Automatic Lighters
(Figure 24). The New York City advertising ﬁrm Samuel C. Croot Co.,
was hired by Thorens, Inc. to develop advertisements for the Thorens
Automatic Lighter, such as the one that appeared in the Collier’s edition
for November 24. 1928. R. K. Kind was the President in Charge of
Advertising, and his duties included managing a yearly advertising
budget of $10,000.85

The message conveyed in the body copy states “Everyone will
appreciate a Thorens—a lighter made in Switzerland with the precision of
a Swiss watch—an automatic lighter in every sense of the word.”86
Furthermore, the Thorens company was conﬁdent that people of United
States who purchased this product would be very pleased with their

investment. In fact, advertisers implied that owners of Thoren Automatic

 

851bid.. 166.

86Thorens, Inc. Advertisement, Collier’s: The National Weekly, (November 24,
1928), 19.

 

49
Lighters would afﬁrm their chic image, based on the fact that Thorens

Automatic Lighters were the vogue in Paris, London and other European
capitals. In any case, the advertiser boasts that one can feel assured
that a Thorens Automatic Lighter known for its handsome design, when
given as a gift, ultimately reﬂects the fashionable taste of the giver."37
Therefore, to reinforce the cachet status of the product, the
designer of the advertisement chose to depict the product utilizing up-to-
date, avant-garde art styles such as cubism and Art Deco. Illuminating
the pictorial composition is the ﬂame from the Thorens Automatic
Lighter. The artist exaggerates the intensity of the ﬂame by dividing the
surrounding space into a series of concentric circles emanating from the
central ﬂame. The chic characteristic of the lighter is emphasized by the
vertical stripes and the shiny reﬂective surface that together provide a
sleek appearance. Hence, as in the Western Electric advertisement
(Figure 23), the Thorens Automatic Lighter and the space that surrounds
it become more abstract due to the dependence on abstract and cubistic
techniques to express the non-verbal message of the advertisement.
There were also advertisements that still utilized traditional art
styles and techniques. For instance, an advertisement for Remington
Rand Business Service Inc. (an ofﬁce supply and service company) was
found in the Collier’s issue for September 22, 1928, and the illustration
for the advertisement was highly naturalistic and rendered in a
traditional manner. Other examples include American Bosch Magneto

Corporation, The Sea Sled Corporation, USL Battery Corporation and

 

87

 

 

so
Hyvis Motor Oil. The subject of these advertisements attests once again

that very few advertisements were aimed at the female audience.
Although avant-garde styles such as cubism were not detected on
Collier’s magazine covers up to and during 1928, they were utilized in
other forms of literature. For example, formalist principles applied to the
cover designs of books, such as the cover of At Sea by William O’Brien,
advertised in the Collier’s issue for December 29, 1928, (Figure 25). The
cover depicts the ship Delkirk caught among mammoth waves at sea, and
the turbulence of the sea is depicted with shattered-like jagged plates of
glass. Consequently, the ship is raised by the surging, large glacier
pyramids which make it virtually impossible for the vessel to escape. The
cubist technique of simple, geometric planes within a composition
conveys the modern, almost futuristic world to be discovered within the
pages of the book; while at the same time, accentuating its mystery
quality, inviting the reader to open the book and begin the voyage.

E. 1929-1930

At the end of the second decade of the twentieth-century, applied
artists continued to employ highly sophisticated avant-garde art styles
like cubism. However, it was cubism, often combined with the emotional
charge and visual elements associated with futurism. This combination
of styles is known as cubo-futurism. It was an appropriate combination
to express the characteristics associated with innovative technology and
products of industry, which are the subjects of these typical
advertisements during this period that best reﬂect the inﬂuence of avant-
garde visual techniques.

51

These subjects, progress, technology, and the hustle and bustle of
metropolitan life, were also subjects for modem American ﬁne artists
such as Joseph Stella’s The Gas Tank (1918), Brooklyn Bridge (1917-
1918), and The Bridge (1920-1922), and John Marin’s Manhattan. St.
Paul’s (1914) to name a few.88 Lloyd Goodrich writing in 1963 notes:

New York . . . the towering buildings, the great bridges. the ﬂow of traffic.
the kaleidoscope of Broadway at night—became themes for the
modernists. especially Marin, Weber, Walkowitz and Stella. Interpreting
the city not by literal representation but in semi-abstract terms they were
the first to express in modern language the essential energies of
machine-age America. In Marin’s often-quoted words: “I see great forces
at work, great movements . . . I can hear the sound of their strife, and

there is great music being played.89

Several developments occurred in the magazine and advertising
industry during this period, which are documented in advertisements
and articles found in magazines like Collier’s. One such reform can be
attributed to Collier’s: it was one of the ﬁrst American magazines to
employ “four-color” illustrations to enhance the quality of the periodical.
This was a very costly process but was also an important element in the
magazine’s success. On January 5, 1929, Collier’s purchased a full page
advertisement in Advertising and Selling magazine announcing its use of
a “four-color” process for its cover designs and illustrations.

Color was used in modernism, and more importantly American
cubism, as an individual element of expression, a technique for
abstraction, and an independent pictorial entity that was not conditioned
by the effects of atmospheric light or perspective. During the early
decades of the twentieth-century, color had been used before within the

 

88Lloyd Goodrich. Pioneers of Modern Art in America: The Decade of the Armory
Show. 1910-1920 (New York: FrederickA. Praeger, Publishers. 1963), 47, 74-77.

89mm. 51.

52
pages of magazines such as Collier’s; however, only black in addition to a

single ﬂat color could be printed. By the end of the 1920s, Collier’s
artists designed its pages and advertisements utilizing color as a main
ingredient, allowing color to “spill” or “bleed” off the pages. No longer was
color conﬁned within the boundaries of a magazine page.90

During this time, American businesses increasingly recognized the
role advertising played in the success of their sales. A leading magazine
entitled Nation’s Business promoted its success by purchasing a full page
advertisement in Collier’s issue for July 6, 1929, (Figure 26). Nation’s
Business is a monthly magazine published in Washington by the United
States Chamber of Commerce, a “businessman’s magazine.” The New
York City advertising ﬁrm hired to market Nation’s Business was Lennen
8: Mitchell. Guy Scrivner, Director of Advertising, was responsible for an
annual advertising budget of $50,000- 100,000. Advertisements such as
this were also seen in newspapers, various magazines, trade papers,

direct mailers and circulars.91

Nation’s Business’ advertising budget was
substantial enough so that it could be marketed in most sectors of
American society. For this reason, businessmen in all branches of
industry proﬁted from this business-oriented publication.

“Nation’s Business prints anything authoritative that tends to
speed up the machinery of industry, that gives information where
information is needed . . . particularly, when it has a man and a reason

behind it.”92 The copy in this advertisement informs the reader that this

 

90Mott, 474; See also n.62.
9‘ The Standard Advertising Register (1929). 409.

92Nation's Business Advertisement. Collier’s: The National Weekly (July 6.
1929). 39.

53
is a businessmen’s magazine. that the intended subscribers were men

and the subject of the articles were chronicles of their professional
experiences. Men recalled problems that they encountered while in
business, which in turn, might help other businessmen overcome similar
circumstances.

Meanwhile, the advertisement ventured into a discussion of
advertising as a means of selling more products. A business’ success.
due in part to advertising, was analyzed in a series of articles that would
appear in upcoming issues of Nation’s Business. The publishers at
Nation’s Business were conﬁdent that these reports were sure to attract
every entrepreneur’s interest in earning proﬁts.

In Collier’s from 1905- 1929, this was the ﬁrst discussion of the
importance of advertising to businesses as a way of competing with rival
institutions with the ultimate purpose of attaining ﬁnancial success.
Advertising was now associated with success and proﬁts, and deemed an
important factor in attaining a proﬁtable future in business. The timing
of issues such as advertising, revenue and proﬁts addressed in this
advertisement is symbolic of the times—in 1929, ﬁnancial disaster
affected the lives of millions of Americans.

The Nation’s Business advertisement (Figure 26) that appeared in
Collier’s in 1929 was intended to increase revenue and circulation, by
imposing its essential uses necessary to every American businessmen.
The advertisement’s message sought to capture the reader’s attention.
However, the body copy was not the only method of seizing the attention
of the reader. The advertisement had other bold devices such as a
unique graphic montage found on the left side of the page. The visual

image was in the shape of a vertical rectangular strip that spanned

54
two-thirds the length of the page. The illustration used cubistic elements

and other abstract styles to form a very graphic representation of the
importance of advertising to media. Various geometric shapes, in
addition to abstracted images of media, were arranged in the rectangular
pictorial area, each positioned at random angles. Furthermore, the word
ADVERTISING and words associated with the media were arranged in the
pictorial composition, serving to divide the various graphic images.
Together, the combination of typography and graphic imagery formed a
visual composition that communicated the importance of advertising.
The designer experimented with type styles by varying the font size and
the direction of the words. The placement and direction of the words
served to unite the compositional elements. The type styles selected for
the words included in the graphic illustration are bold and
contemporary, suggesting the force of advertising and its impact upon
modern society.

Another advertisement for Nation's Business appeared in Collier’s:
The National Weekly edition for August 10, 1929, (Figure 27). Two
illustrations consist of composite, futuristic, graphic pictorial images.
The ﬁrst drawing conveys emotions such as intensity, fervency, strength,
and power of a United States Congressman as he zealously petitions in
the House of Representatives. The heightened emotions of the event are
effectively expressed by combining the formal elements of abstract styles
like cubism and futurism. A combination of sweeping lines. tilted
points-of-view, and an assemblage of several graphic images packed into
a single composition convey the swift movement of the representative’s

body, and visually express the intensity, energy and vigor of the moment.

55
The second drawing in the Nation’s Business’ advertisement for

August 10, 1929. depicts a factory scene illustrating men hard at work.
Several vignettes are combined in a montage composition. While each
scene is an “independent” image, the composition as a whole visually
expresses the dynamism of modern technology and industry. Doubtless,
the strength of the male American work force was predominate and is
implied using tilted points-of-view—industry, and the vigor and energy of
its employees are symbolized in the electriﬁed movement of the
illustration, that probably communicate the feelings of the time.

A relatively new mode of transportation, aviation, captured the
attention and interest of the modern American businessmen, and
numerous editorials appeared in Nation’s Business during the 19205
featuring this new science: such as, A New Era that Dawns in Industry by
Edsel Ford; What the Auto Industry Thinks of Flying by the President of
the Jordan Motor Company; and Making Us Air-Minded by Harry
Guggenheim. The importance of aviation to modern business was
stressed in an advertisement for Nation’s Business that appeared in the
Collier’s edition for September 14, 1929, (Figure 28). “Nation’s Business
had always realized and carried through to completion its responsibilities
for projecting a graphic picture of everything that was important to
American industry, particularly, every new thing.”93

At the top of the September 14, 1929, advertisement for Nation’s
Business is a drawing of an airplane, represented during a night ﬂight.
The darkness does not appear to interrupt the ﬂight, nor challenge the
safety of the passengers. And also at night, is the airﬁeld that appears in

 

93Nation’s Business Advertisement. Collier's: The National Weekly (September
14. 1929). 29.

 

 

56
the bottom illustration. Beams of light project from the tower up toward

the plane ﬂying in the dark sky. The beams of light provide the artist
with a means to break up pictorial images and their surrounding space,
by dividing into geometric shapes, whatever intersects the light paths.94

The July 6, 1929, (Figure 26) and September 14, 1929, (Figure 28)
advertisements for Nation’s Business that appeared in Collier’s magazine
served modern businessmen by informing them of up-to-date technology
that was now available for the purpose of making their businesses more
proﬁtable and efficient. The July 6, 1929, advertisement stressed the
importance of advertising to businesses in attaining a proﬁtable future.
The advertisement emphasized the power of advertising by using
modernistic pictorial elements such as the cubist montage. The visual
image was stunning and helped “sell” the message of the Nation's
Business advertisement. The September 14, 1929, advertisement for
Nation’s Business illustrated how modern transportation such as
airplanes could reduce the amount of time spent traveling and make
their professional lives more time efﬁcient and productive. Futhermore.
passengers who chose to ﬂy could be assured of their safety.

Gasoline fueled these modern modes of transportation during the

 

1920s. It was also the subject of Bendix Aviation Corporation’s
advertisement which appeared in the Collier's edition for July 27 , 1929,
(Figure 29). Bendix Aviation Corporation built the Bendix Drive. the

Bendix Aviation Starter, ignition and carburetion equipment in addition

 

94"The development of the commercial airplane has added a new note to
advertising. The airship, with its long, graceful lines. and with its backgrounds of sky
and landscape, offers untold opportunities to the artist with a feeling for decoration and
design” (Rosenberg. 143).

 

57
to Bendix Brakes.95 The company hired a Chicago-based advertising
ﬁrm known as Williams & Cunnyingham, Inc., to meet the advertisement
needs of Bendix. H. L. Sharlock, Advertising Manager for Bendix
Aviation Corporation, managed an annual advertising budget of $50,000-
100,000. Advertisements marketing Bendix products appeared
throughout the United States in newspapers, magazines, billboards,
trade papers, novelties and circulars.96

The designer for this advertisement. Dick Richard,97 used a
combination of elements from abstract styles such as cubism and
futurism, cubo-futurism—a synthesis of cubist abstract representation of
forms and the futurist regard for motion and time. In advertisements
like this one, the modernistic combination of styles resulted in the
simplicity of fundamental geometric shapes and lines to convey the idea
of rapid movement and energy, and in turn, express the power of
gasoline in modern transportation.

Shapes of cars, buses and other vehicles are drawn abstractly in
the bottom half of the Bendix advertisement (Figure 29). Richard used
non-continuous contour lines to suggest the shape of the vehicles, and
the high speed at which they are moving. Furthermore, the designer
accentuates the velocity of the vehicles by including a geometric, grid-like
pattern created by the paths of the speeding automobiles, buses and
trucks. This illustration is powerful, energetic and dynamic—probably
qualities that the advertiser hoped to instill in the image of the product.

 

95Bendix Aviation Corporation Advertisement, Collier's: The National Weekly
(July 27, 1929), 40.

96The Standard Advertising Register (1929), 47 1.

97Bendix Aviation Corporation Advertisement. 40.

 

 

58
Cast Iron Pipe Research Association offered a variety of cast iron

pipes that could be used to create gas lines, water lines, sewer lines, and
road culverts. Barrows, Richardson, Alley and Richards Co. was a New
York City advertising ﬁrm hired by Cast Iron Pipe Publicity Bureau to
help advocate this progressive technology.98

A full-page advertisement for cast iron pipe appeared in the
Collier’s edition for September 7, 1929, (Figure 30). The drawing, which
occupies the upper half of the page. depicts a futuristic thoroughfare
with cars speeding through its corridors. The designer utilized the cubo-

futurism style to create an effective and dynamic advertisement that

 

stresses the speed associated with the function of highways and the
materials that are used to build them: power, endurance and strength.
The designer used abstract, geometric shapes and lines, in addition to
eliminating contour lines in selected parts of the car to convey to the
reader the sensation of high velocity. Hurling speeds, congested trafﬁc.
and high-tech thoroughfares were a new phenomena at this time.
However, the illustration and the style used to depict the scene, in
addition to the high quality and enduring characteristics of cast iron pipe
show that people were thinking about the future. Therefore, city

 

planners and engineers believed that cast iron pipes, if used at this time.
would detour any conﬂicts or problems in the future. The abstract
elements of cubo-futurism, effectively communicated the enduring
qualities of the product, while at the same time creating a modern visual
image of the future. Not only do these pictorial elements successfully
convey modern transportation, technology, in addition to speed, but the

 

98The Standard Advertising Register, (1929), 542.

 

59
acute angle or dramatic perspective of the highway instills in the minds

of its viewers the serious nature and responsibilities that accompany
technology. These compositional techniques help the reader understand
the importance of this situation, and how it will effect the future of
modern America.

An additional advertisement advocating the usefulness of cast iron
pipe appeared in the Collier’s issue for October 5, 1929, (Figure 31). The
subject of this advertisement continues to be the effectiveness of cast
iron pipe in meeting the progressive needs of America. However, this
advertisement now depicts the relationship of cast iron pipe to the white-
collar worker. Engineers, town planners, city businessmen are all aware
of the proven quality of cast iron pipe, but now, in addition to the
strength and durability of the product, consumers and cities who
purchase cast iron pipe, are aware that they are buying the best. In
addition, the image conveys the machine aesthetic and faith in
mechanization and industrialization by using cast iron pipe. Therefore,
cast iron pipe now serves as a “vogue” status symbol among industrial
groups. The avant—garde style. cubo-futurism, is successfully employed
in advertising modern technological products, that when purchased, the
consumer can feel conﬁdent that they bought the best.

By the early 1930s, modernistic styles began to be used to promote
common everyday consumer products. However, unlike the previous
advertisements already discussed, these modernistic advertisements
were no longer relegated to products aimed at a male audience, nor were
they related exclusively to technology, innovation and industry. Instead,

these were advertisements for products that denied gender barriers,

 

so
crossing over many institutional “boundaries” that were “understood” by

publishers, advertisers and artists during the 19205.

For example, an advertisement for Grape Nuts appeared in the
Collier’s edition for February 8, 1930, (Figure 32). The New York
advertising ﬁrm Young & Rubicam was hired to direct the marketing
plans for Post Products Co., Inc. Ralph Starr Butler was the General
Advertising Manager, and C. A. Wiggins was Assistant to the General
Advertising Manager. These two were responsible for an enormous
advertising budget of over $1,000,000. 99

The composition of the advertisement is arranged as the artist’s
rendered an extremely close, bird’s-eye point-of-view of a breakfast table.
Arranged on top of the table are a bowl of Grape Nuts, a spoon, milk and
sugar. The tablecloth, imprinted with a natural grain motif, creates a
contrasting background. Meanwhile, the composition is broken up into
various geometric shapes due to the strong contrasts of light that reﬂect
and make shadows. Once again the artist has manipulated light to
abstract the pictorial images. However, reﬂecting the practices of ﬁne art
modernist painters, the graphic artist hence carefully moderated the
degree of abstraction, while still allowing the image to be recognized.

During 1929- 1930, although avant-garde advertisements were
frequently found within the pages of American magazines, traditional
visual representation methods were still popular. Some examples
include advertisements for Texaco Gasoline, Listerine Tooth Paste,
Chrysler Motors, Gillette Safety Razor Company, and Chesterﬁeld

Cigarettes. During this period there were also more advertisements

 

99Ibid.. 173.

 

61

aimed at the needs of the female audience such as an Ace Comb
advertisement—Ace combs were used by chic ﬁfth-avenue hairdressers

such as Emile. 100

V. Conclusion

Cubism is just one avant-garde style, which developed during the
early decades of the twentieth-century, that had a profound impact on
commercial arts in America. This was due primarily to the actions of
tum-of-the-century ﬁne artists who developed a modernistic artistic
doctrine relying on the language of form, for the purpose of intensifying
the expressive message of a design.101 Furthermore, Cubists enhanced
the conceptual element of form in order to give the viewer a fuller
understanding of the subject’s formal properties, thereby, depicting the
fundamental characteristics that were required for its identiﬁcation.
These practices helped establish the formal properties of design that were
utilized by commercial artists and advertisers to express the
contemporary image of their business or product.

As I discovered in my study of Collier’s, advertisements that were
cubistic in style were almost always relegated to the pages within the
magazine. In fact, abstract styles based on the principles of formalism
were commonly suited to expressing the intangible qualities of a product,
while at the same time heightening the abstract complexity of an

advertisement’s visual design. On the other hand, the

 

looCollier’s: The National Weekly. (September 7. 1929)-

101Moszynska, 1 1. Paul Cézanne investigated the properties of form for pictorial
expression. Later, Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque expanded upon Cézanne’s
philosophy, and developed the style known as Cubism.

 

 

 

62
nineteenth-century poster art style was more suitable for Collier’s cover

illustrations because it made the cover more readable when viewed at a
distance. Second, groups of magazines were usually displayed in
bookstands. For this reason, magazine publishers experimented with
different methods of attracting attention. Therefore, it was believed that
poster designs were an excellent means of initially capturing the viewer’s
attention by serving as a creative visual advertisement for the magazine.
Furthermore, magazine executives realized that consumers did not all
have the same aesthetic tastes in artistic styles. Instead of risking
offending the public with modernistic art styles, they opted for
conservative, traditional styles.

The end of the ﬁrst decade of the twentieth-century marked the
development of the modern magazine. Previously, magazine executives
and advertisers relied on the message contained within the body copy as
the primary method of communication, while the advertisement’s
pictorial art served a secondary role. By the early to mid-teens, this
practice was slowly reversed. Publishers and advertisers agreed that
formal elements used in an advertisement could successfully convey
pertinent information about a product or business, thereby relegating the
body copy to a secondary role. Eventually, visual advertisements and
pictorial illustrations came to dominate the contents of American
magazines.

From the mid-teens through the 19205, graphic and advertising
arts served advertising, sales, and service functions that were, in turn,
directly inﬂuenced by the demands of a prospering consumer society.
Therefore, by the 19205, progressive applied artists relied upon styles
that manipulated principles of formalism such as cubism, futurism and

 

 

63

thrusting it into association with the smartness of novelty, fashion and

”102 In addition, these abstract art styles correctly

the latest mode.
symbolize the innovation and the strength of technology. In short, the
use of formulas and motifs of Modern Art in advertisements probably
contributed to the viewer’s decision to purchase a product.

Collier’s: The National Weekly was an excellent example of a
popular early twentieth-century magazine, that drew audiences from all
segments of society, and it was considered an innovator among its

competitors, as one of the ﬁrst magazines to employ a four-color process

for its cover designs and illustrations. It also happened to be a magazine

 

which employed artists interested in utilizing avant-garde art styles.
These characteristics attracted advertisers who sought abstract pictorial
styles and creative advertisement layouts to enhance the qualities of their
product.

By the late 19205, magazine artists frequently selected avant—garde

art styles such as cubism or cubo-futurism, not only to depict products

 

related to technology, but also to express a mood or quality associated
with a particular product, or the fast-paced, rapidly industrialized

 

consumer environment. The illustration for the Knox Hat advertisement
in the Collier’s edition of May 12, 1928, (Figure 20), resembles a cubist
montage—grouping everyday scenes into a single fragmented and
multi-faceted pictorial image. The artist dramatized the effects of
climatic elements—rain and sunshine—by indicating their presence
using diagonal lines that divide the composition. This technique
heightened the abstract quality of the composition, and at the same time

 

102Marchand,142: See also n.40.

 

64

added another dimension to the drawing—motion. By using avant-garde
styles such as cubism and cubo-futurism, the artist was able to express
the intangible qualities of a product. By breaking up the scenes in this
manner. the artist hoped to evoke a response from the viewer—a sense of
enthusiasm and excitement concerning the practicality, yet fashionable
beneﬁts of owning a Knox Hat.

Another notable aspect of the advertisements that appeared in
Collier's, pertained to the decision made by publishers, advertisers and
artists to use abstract styles such as cubism cube-futurism in
advertisements. Primarily, advertisers and artists utilized avant-garde
styles for male-oriented products, and for denoting qualities of industry
and technology such as cast iron pipe (Figure 30). Forrnalistic abstract
illustrations were useful in evoking an expressive quality about a
product, a non-verbal message that was revealed due to an increase in
abstraction.

It was believed that the adult male was responsible for making the
ﬁnal purchase decision, therefore, perhaps advertisers restricted their
use of abstract visual imagery to male-oriented items. Modemistic
pictorial styles were often used by advertisers to express the exotic,
fashionable qualities of their product. Since men were believed to have
the ﬁnal purchase decision, advertisers lured the male-audience by
advertising masculine products using forrnalistic visual principles.
However, this would slowly change by the end of the 1920s. Publishers,
advertisers and artists developed advertisements for products such as
Grape Nuts (Figure 32), which denied gender barriers, and instead

satisﬁed the needs of many.

 

 

65
From the 19205 to the present, applied artists have continued to

manipulate and expand upon the fundamental elements of formalism
that resulted in sophisticated, highly creative, abstract advertisements.
Although advertising and graphic artists owe their success, in part, to
cubism; cubism and Modern Art, alternatively, are indebted to
advertising. For this reason, one notices that artists opted to employ
early avant—garde styles like cubism, to portray technological,
fashionable, exotic and chic products. Indeed, modernistic
advertisements seen in magazines during the 19205. which embodied
abstract pictorial imagery, sans-serif type styles, and asymmetrical
layouts, aided in promoting new forms of presentation, such as the
cubist style, to accentuate the features of a product. In effect,
progressive magazine advertisements such as those discussed in this
paper, led in part, to the public’s eventual acceptance of Modern Art

styles like cubism.

 

 

LIST OF FIGURES

 

66

 

 

\

 

 

Figure 1: Design by Robert Foster that appeared in L. B.
Siegfried’s “Modernism Emerges Full-Fledged,”
Advertising and Selling (February 8. 1928).

 

 

66

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 1: Design by Robert Foster that appeared in L. B.
Siegfried's “Modernism Emerges Full-Fledged,"
Advertising and Selling (February 8, 1928).

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appeared in The New Republic
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Figure 3: The Seven Arts advertisement that

appeared in The New Republic
(November 1 1, 1916).

 

 

 

69

 

 

President and
Passenger

B.» \11111 11 Mom“
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Rosabcl P111114... " I /

B? M KM. UH] \\ if D! MLX / 1 /

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Making a 1‘ 'A
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B1 WILl ADAM;

Jimmy '5
Par!
311 PAULINE PHELPS

 

 

 

Figure 4: Collier’s: The National Weekly cover for

October 1 1, 1913.

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President and
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Rosabcl Paradise ' ‘ I I /

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Jimmy's Speaking
ar!
By PAULINE PHEI PS

 

 

Figure 4: Collier’s: The National Weekly cover for
October 1 1, 1913.

 

70

 

 

 

 

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73““; on: now no;

 

Figure 5: Collier's: The National Weekly cover for
November 19. 1927.

 

 

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70

 

 

,Puauc LIBRARY

 

 

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Figure 5: Collier‘s: The National Weekly cover for
November 19, 1927.

 

 

 

71

 

 

54‘ a copy

"In!”

6lliers

TIONAL WEEKLY
Read this
WITWER :r' Tory
Jack and Jilt”

 
  

\ /ae/u can: no.
a mu up

 

Figure 6: Collier’s: The National Weekly 00ver for
November 12, 1927.

 

71

 

 

 

head this
WITWER r‘-1tory
Jack and Jilt”

 

  

r! .
\ my; can"

     

8

Im
Iona up

 

Figure 6: Collier’s: The National Weekly cover for
November 12. 1927.

 

 

 

 

72

 

 

MAZDA l

“Not the name 0/ a thing, but the mark of a union" 2!

Instead of one manufacturer’s spasmod-
ic development of his product. MAZDA
Service substitutes a systematic; all-in-
clusive study of incandescent electric
lamps for several manufacturers.

Tm: MEANING or MAZDA

MAZDA in the llldt‘mll’k of a world- isczntemdindle Rene-rchhbanud-
wide service to ceruin llmp mnnufw of the Ceucrll Electric Company u
mun. lu purpose is lo collect Ind Schenccud .New York.
helm scientiﬁc Ind pncliul informn- e mu DA can lppelr a
lion concerning progress and develop- lamp; which meet the I of
' e In of incandeu‘eni lump MAZDA nice. ll In nuan-
mnnufuturing Ind lo dislribule lhll lure of qnnlily. Thi- Indcmnrk in Ilia
information lo the companies entitled property of the General Electric Calls
meiv ' ' nny.

' 5cm
RESEARCH LABORATORIES OF THE
GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY

 

 

 

Figure 7: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 24. 1917).

______A

 

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({{(’lll(llllll(llll(ll(((/i/l ((1! ( (ill (

72

 

 

‘ MAZD

“Not the name of a thing. but the mark of a savior”

Instead of one manufacturer’s spasmod-
ic development of his product. MAZDA
Service substitutes a systematic, all-in-
clusive study of incandescent electric
lamps for several manufacturers.

THE MEANING or MAZDA

MAZDA in the trulemnrk of a world- '

with service to certain lnm

information to the comp-nits entitled
to receive thin service. . [AZDA Service

The uni-k IAZDA can oppuronl a
lamp: which meet the I of
hull» Service. til thlu In our»
Incc of quality. Thi- lrldemnrl in the
property of the Generll Electric Co.-

puny.

RESEARCH LABORATORIES OF THE
GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY

 

 

Figure 7: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 24. 1917).

 

iwxbﬁ _\ p_

73

 

 

M
Sc' tiﬁc ‘tud eou led With pram
mifdifacttiringy meSJods—this is the

basis of the MAZDA Service thnthclpa
lamp-makers produce better lamps.

 

 

    

 

 

I
@nbum u Lxuurummm or cumin. Euzcnuc COMPANY
.-

Wm

 

 

Figure 8: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (August 25. 1917).

nwww

73

 

 

_/. .
Scientiﬁc study eou led wuh practical
manufacturing me e51 —th19 is the
basisof the MAZDA Service thathelpa
lamp-makers produce better lamps.

 

 

 

 

 

@nm .uuu LullIlumlllE 01- new ELECTRIC comm
ﬂ

 

Figure 8: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (August 25 1917).

 

 

74

 

 

   
     

Man-widow"

From the incominrr host
of new ideas on glit-
mg, MAZDA Serviccse-
lects for the makers of
MAZDA Lamps, only
those developments in
design, materials and
methods that will im-
prove thelight you enjoy

 

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numnmn-n—tu. vuu-u. “:3 r.“ ’"“"""",._, . g... n-v-L “-
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® RESEARCH LABORATORIES OF GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY
.-

 

Figure 9: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (February 24. 1917).

 

74

 

 

    

From the incoming host \
of new ideas on light-
ing, MAZDA Service se-
lects for the makers of
MAZDA Lamps, only
those developments in
esign, materials and
methods that will im-
prove the light you enjoy

 

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® RESEARCH LABORATORIES OF GENERAL ELECTRIC COMPANY
'——"‘ ‘ II

 

Figure 9: The Mazda advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (February 24. 1917).

 

 

 

75

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 10: Design by Robert Foster that appeared
in L. B. Siegfried's “Modernism Emerges
Full-Fledged." Advertising and Selling
(February 8. 1928).

.N-“’ M ‘MM

 

 

'l if "((i(

75

 

 

 

 

Figure 10: Design by Robert Foster that appeared
in L. B. Siegfried's “Modernism Emerges
Full-Fledged." Advertising and Selling
(February 8. 1928).

 

 

76

 

 

tum 111111011

N EW in dress, make-up, contents, price—all news Famous
writers, spirited illustrations, sprightly covers. Beginning
nent month. Modem as tomormw. And still as authentic as

a Treasury Note.

 
  
  
  
  
 
  

ONE at America s great art directors is commissiOned to
make The Mentor the most beautiful magazine of its kind
In the world Wotrh (or the striking September issue, on
sale at the better news stands August 30th

 

a tug ’ ‘ ,
SEPTEMBER 1 1 -.
memo» ' ‘ '

   

 

25 CENTS A (on ‘2 50 A ma

K "T’IENTO

 

 

Figure 1 1: The Mentor advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (September 7. 1929).

 

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a

 

. I {‘I‘ 1’10 ‘15 ll ll(((ll(((:( «'01

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76

 

 

Fa ,1“..an 1111mm

NEW in dress, make-up, contents, price—all new. Famous
writers, spirited illustrations, sprightly covers. Beginning
next month. Modern as tomorrow And still as authentic as

   
  
  
  
   

a Treasury Note.

ON[otAmer1(O s great art directors is commissioned to
make The Mentor the most beautiful magazine of its kind
in the world Watch tor the striking September issue, on
sale at the better news stands August 30th.

   

 

 

........... ., 1,
SEPYEMBER '1
MENTOR ' _
l-h '9'
25 CENTS A com ’250 A YEAR

 

 

Figure 11: The Mentor advertisement that appeared in
Collier's: The National Weekly (September 7 , 1929).

 

 

77

 

 

"l-h-ul-M"hl£~rl-

"Arr 111m. 111: Appeal
Ilfig "

1:.- ms . r1111... >1 rm I-o

 

 

 

 

Figure 12: “Art with the Appeal of a Bullfight," Collier’s:

The National Weekly (February 1 5. 1 9 1 3).

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77

 

 

   

    
   
   

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Figure 12: “Art with the Appeal of a Bullfight,” Collier’s:
The National Weekly (February 15, 1913).

 

 

 

 

 

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An Exhibition by I‘l Unexhibllrd

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Figure 13: “An Exhibition by the Unexhibited.” Collier’s:

The National Weekly (January 31 . 1 9 1 4).

.W-‘ “J JM‘M'J Ms1.1 __

 

 

78

 

 

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dolun-s Ion ruin" u. III...'“~"-am
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Figure 13: “An Exhibition by the Unexhibited,” Collier’s:
The National Weekly (January 31. 1914).

 

 

 

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l “1 \ ﬁﬁK.’-
\

79
‘

 

 

CIG RETTES

in the nclerful MECCA
Turkish d you get all the
rare qu es of the world's
choicest -baccos—-flavor
. sweet, delightful

rance and exqui-

site mil .- found only in the
highest 5 of Turkish and
domestic . This Quality has
made ’5 A the largest sell-
ing br .1 “Americaétoday.

.—_.A- _

 

 

 

 

Figure 14: Mecca advertisement that appeared in
Collier's: The National Weekly (February 6. 1915).

’WH-M~ -
M

 

79

 

CIG RETTES

in the -nderful MECCA
Turkish d you get all the
rare qu es of the world's
choicest baccos—flavor
, sweet, delightful

rance and exqui-

~ found only in the

' of Turkish and

A the largest sell-
2 Americajtoday.

 

[- tho wul tail
posh-e ul truly.

 

 

 

Figure 14: Mecca advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (February 6, 1915).

 

80

 

—

. CIGARETTES

   
 
 
 

a ‘ 1 a” . _
ﬂu. ‘ ' "01.00 ,

1 , .0 .1“ .
“:9...... “Q; -
= o s.
It”. MECCA ‘s

1105“
t"?

has stand- it
ardized ciga- '6 w

L
V

3
1 0
30.0.0'

O
l ﬂ

2?,
O
I
\

rette Quality '15 "
, '1 ‘1’ 039's —made “Perfect '1
: ): :{ Satisfaction” a daily, year-’round E} _
.1 : certainty for millions of smokers. E j
1 :0: This explains the enormous MECCA I:
I, ; g sales—greater than any other brand I;
: in America. I' ‘
, '1‘" A trial will convince you this wonderful 1: '

'3 Turkish Blend cigarette deserves its 1‘ f
‘ Eli. national popularity. ‘- '

3 A; 111111. 111.111 511.1. 5 c

5. 11, 10 a...
1k

._ .

n In the Oval Fall 1:
I . 1:; Package, 20 for 10

' ““1.

“w. 1:." "30': 1

 

 

 

Figure 15: Mecca advertisement that appeared in
Collier's: The National Weekly (April 24, 1915).

 

~.

J

80

 

toLull'u Dul AFIII. la. III.

N 1%

   

 

  

MW"

 

« \, CIGARETTES
4. ~ ‘ "My
, - . “iv” ‘.
. .' ‘b‘lﬁb -
aft?" "2. .
o. n ' z. T
".O: ’ MECCA 'ti
‘o o" I: I ’ I has stand- ‘2 .7
) 5 .9 “' *\ ardized ciga- '6; .-
d .5)... ‘ rette Quality '. '~
f ' 3, M98," —made “Perfect '3; .
i 5 I Satisfaction" a daily, year- ’round 1
; i: I certainty for millions of smokers. I’
l :0: This explains the enormous MECCA I _
, ; sales—greater than any other brand E '-
11 in America. :1
' 3,; A trial will convince you this wonderful I1“ '
I ’1‘. Turkish Blend cigarette deserves its I1,"
‘ {1‘ national popularity.
A 1
,‘n In the 'IH7IdyM Slide 5 c
‘3. 33:33:52? 10°
, ..

 

 

Figure 15: Mecca advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (April 24, 1915).

 

d__________.l

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 16: The Delineator magazine
advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 8, 1919).

h WﬂM—_ _

81

 

 

The Seats of
the Mighty

To in an idea of the
might 0 women as a com-
mercial factor in the mod-
em world, realize that
Delineator families, for
whom the household pur-
chasing is done by women,
are spendin 339,3“) for
furniture to- ay, and spend
that same amount every
day in the year that the
stores are open. Nearly
every household necessity
that woman does not pur-
chase direct, shc inﬂuences
the choice of. To sell your
goods, describe them to the.
women “purchasmg agents
of American homes.

The '
Delineator

" /
7133 62:7, 17%,: ”Homes

 

Figure 16: The Delineator magazine
advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 8, 1919).

 

if V _ ~ -_..-_\ 'ﬁ,‘ -\ __,i\ ______ ~.—\-.\_’\’-\ -‘\

82

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 1 7: The Delineator magazine
advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 29. 1919).

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”9"”

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Figure 1 7: The Delineator magazine
advertisement that appeared in
The New Republic (March 29. 1919).

 

 

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Figure 18: Robert Haven Schauﬂler. “Where have I heard that tune before?."
Collier’s: The National Weekly (July 3. 1926).

 

 

 

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Figure 18: Robert Haven Schauﬂler. “Where have I heard that tune before?."
Collier’s: The National Weekly (July 3. 1926).

 

 

 

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0 All around tbi: page Jot/ll ﬁeld Nameogap/JI mated

by :lu'lled and. or that matter, limb 4 reader: 15"
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Figure 19: Nameographs. Collier’s: The National Weekly
(February 25. 1928).

 

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Figure 20: Knox Hat advertisement that appeared in
Collier's: The National Weekly (May 12. 1928).

i N-“ ”u." OM“...-

85

 

 

 
 
 
 
 

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01qu Knm urn P
M and up

   
   

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Figure 20: Knox Hat advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (May 12. 1928).

 

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86

 

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HIE~TE\II'EI11\TIIHL- Ill \llDIT‘ * IATIZII ' BEARD - >IJII' * .~M\cu\ln1‘lns ~ ll} “.1" ~ NEIHES ‘ LATIII

 

Gillette must do a different jol) for you each day I
—wilh a blade which does all of them superbly

"E Indie! my In 'lif or full. sum or (Re-inf. when Ihr dull} nullrul ol Ill-Ila .. In. (5.. . W 1.
the Illrl‘ mu he hot or cold. llnnl or null; Imir di- "" "k I' m “‘1' l" W" lulu-ha il-r- me: I"
- ' mun n Fri-11, banal mi Mum, «mm-d (.illnu Ill-h

l ”"45"" "" I“ ""|"- "“l 5‘“ 1"“ ""‘ “W" ln‘rllitw- “Jun": n. .m» Irnallmmunllh .11 n brh. "—-
.m|u and Mr . but. i... “.4. mm. m mun mvin

”“1 snag»

 

‘ M u. a: I...- [My «Ilia—l u..— .a, 3..., 0.11....

..,_J . . . . I . 1 1 L 13.1 . . ,

an F r uul [Mm miner-pl: 4...... .iuiui mun .bm—ny

11 ﬂ" ‘_ _ mm P, . “A. ruviu- . Inn... to. mr, mun. (MW .
..
slum muff-unable shun-dul- yeollhiu-Ih III-Willa Ihm you Allp ywr [In]: Gillan Ill-Ir' .
umm'rn-d-mo olikGlﬂnuIHo—ihea-ymo Inlnnrw- Inn suing. mar-inn n... il Inn-Jilrmujohub ‘4
“Hummus-1M,“ urhd- y—Illlduallvilhm‘nﬂllllﬂm ‘4
GILLETTE sum" luzun cu" nosmn.u.s... k

Gﬂldumalduldy-nhlﬂnmi-Ihkli'ﬂ'l

 

 

 

 

Figure 2 1: Gillette Safety Razor Company advertisement that
appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly (June 30. 1928).
l

(-‘ffll
(ill/i (i

i./i//I’l("i ii

‘
l‘

 

86

 

l Gillan I- I— in. nu

   

 

 

(NE TE‘H'EII \Tl ltli ' III \IlDlT\ ‘ ‘ATEK ' HILAItl! ' ~llll' §kl\(,|l\lIITIU\ - III \I I" ‘ \l ["55 . lJTlll

Gillette must do a diﬂ‘ereni job for you each day
—with a blade which does all of them superbly

IE unllirr my In fair or {MIL ham or Inning: Ill“! KIM Ill”) vulyun nt l-l-in In In- than - Inn-deal '-
um um um I. hot a! mid. Innl or .un; unit or "'- m-h h m --I|~ I" rrv-m sum-mm -I~n an m
' ' mill-ml lrrlﬁ uh haunt .n-J Muml. «mm-«I hllldlr nun

‘ . do \ ur
‘ """‘ """ “M" u" "°""°" "' ’"u' 'h'" '0 ‘ " Iv." n..- ,.|...i mu .m. r... n.“- LII-An nn- u...» in Mm.

Brnt'uilm- .ru ,m. a”... um I... i...., W. hum.

mull..." nulluplnl In um Irﬂ-Ihulllllllll'l «I u Ian "I.-

 

n," n... u WIN" Ill,“ mun-u thy Inn-r lull-«r .hll mul-l anrr hupr (up ill‘.‘ mryy. The blade. Invilv

m J . ,’ , . . l . ;.i .1 1 1 I1- I L .. h
l. ,. , 1| I . . u | .

_ uul ul am, we employee. m mun: 1.1m...- .u- can”,

11m 1. Jun! 0.. m .1" ,a. .1. an,- r: “M" - '---- (M wry I-I-ar an w

“L
.1,“ "“4"“... .5... ....,.'..., «IIJIII-h—lheile-Shk. ‘brn ,1... 4., ,1»... (ml- mum. aw inlu )I-r n—
, L .. .._. . mm...,... L i .. .. .

.
In: uni. um. y... am, Mr. ml. «4...»: .1... a. .m. mum-I.» ms“.
Clllﬂlc mm mm, nah mam—m In an Minn-‘11; GILLETTE sunr nuun cos non-oh, v.5...

 

 

 

 

Figure 2 1: Gillette Safety Razor Company advertisement that
appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly (June 30. 1928).

87

 

  

 

 

     

     

II. II" IIllI IIIII III III in r

 

11": BIG FELLOW I- IIII
in IIIIIII— n IIInII—si/IIII li~IfIIl of III .IIIIIIIIIIII

Ir!"

7.7., F

    
 

IIIIII lIIIII'Il and “III lIIIIl IIIIII.I IIl ﬂllll lIIII-Il -~I llll\ IIIIII

 
 

easily ll shun-4 'I'lIII II\II'II ~iII- IIIIII lIIII'l IIIIIl lIII-ir

   

Wright in llll' I-IIIIII-III. EIH‘!‘ llllllll‘.

   

ll‘s liIIIr )IIII I|i~I'IIIrI‘I-Il Illl' IIII'II IIIIIII- of [III-
er’ ImIIrIIII'Il (lilll'lll‘. lI 1"IIIII21“ )IHII' \\ IIIIII- uni.
\twsnxmnn Thaw—I‘— m'jc “,‘mnl \uur IIIIIrIIiIIg slum-I: Sum-ml IIfII I|i~-

Mk .

    
 

Jun.- . . . . I
up“: 1|.th (I'L'I‘L‘t‘ﬂllll' rlnurr. II I II nlmrl‘ I." m. L. Ilml'y m...” ..r LwI-LLJ—
wnlh'iy'wh‘“" l.|.-Inun'. Clllﬂ'lli‘ Suﬁ-IV IlII/IIr ( 'II., "ml-III, l. S. ,\, "‘"T":'“"5'f"“:
,. I." “a... M w— ' u I— I- _
us..m-I—u.-I.n THE NEW/MPROVED “'r----III-- II-A-I

LI. . mu I.‘ II... "I,

SAFETY RAZOR

“VII 'l'o SEVENTY-FIVE DOLLARS

WWH-ﬁ-I—d .
u-hh-nl-ﬂivl-di' Ila-Ionian". «ﬂu—4
puma-yum“ 1 e e ..I. ﬁts-«d...
cI-u-u-(c-IIW “'P'“ “BI-h
*Ini-Azio WM .

 

 

Figure 22: Gillette Safety Razor Company advertisement
that appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly
(July 28, 1928).

.J

 

 

 

J

87

 

 

(CSturdy— éul‘yml/e

  
  

 

uaDl I.

no». I~I

BIG HLLOW

   

 

r III; III(.
III I IIII

 

I
nInII IIIIIII'II IIIIII lIIIi~|III II IIII'I'I II I“' -III IIII\~II IIIl
Imilv it .IIIII-IIu' I"III \IIII ~i/II IIIIII III' III IIIIII IIIII' 'lr

\‘IIIgIII lII IIII- ~IIIIIIIIII. -IIIII I>I1IIII.

Il's IIIIII‘ \IIII lII‘I'U‘l‘I‘I‘lI IIIII IIII'I- \IIIIII‘ III IIII'
New IIIIIIrIIIIIII (LiIIIIIII‘. Il I'IIIIII;_III-I )Illlr \\ IllIIi‘ IIIII-
W's-'“mmm'm IIIIIc louIIIrII )lllll’ "II-null}: hIHI\l‘:III-II'1III IIIII III~- n. 0mm.

 

T| I'KAI’AY. All lb

w
thaw-l. ".1." ‘
u—m-p—n.

”I“ oldl-‘W . . . .
III,- u—kk ' 4r ugh-"able I'IIIIrI'V II II II blmrl, IIII (III. II IIIIIII' rIIIIIII III rah-“mu
uncut-nann— I-I-III- IIIl'llHum (.illI- IIII- SIII’I- II II. mu- r(n.. MIMI-II. l. S \. “mumﬂ‘hb‘
GIV-ill -

Lemma. THE NEWIMPROVED

nap-III
MhMmﬂmhI—l“
“Lamb-"119““i' [hum-ﬁlm ﬂ:
“mama: Gillette :ﬁﬁm
I__r.—a SAF ETY RAZOR “—P-

FIVE 1'0 SEVENTY-FIVE DOLLARS

 

 

Figure 22: Gillette Safety Razor Company advertisement
that appeared In Collier's: The National Weekly
(July 28, 1928).

 

 

 

. . .via Western Electric

HE progm-n that tgou on the
air through the well-known Western
Electric micro mphone and brondcuting
equipment an come into your home
thmhtthuttmEkCI'ric CON. 560-A.\ W7
Ioudspa
mlW-ltck up! your radio with thin new

”It; It tell anI (II (he wonderIul things
there are nthc lit—thing! you do not
mpcclnn mid cannot enjuy until you have

a loudspeaker Ilmt hrings them to you,
dc liute tune lrnm the highest.
sheen-st Ii olino tremolo to the eepal,
fullest 'cellodn
All-a quality II inherent In this
Wearrn mElritric loudspea er. t in part
OII 50-year old traditi uon covering :I
whole family III related product: in the
Iic l ocI mmuniution includin ng the
nation' I million: II Iftclephoncs and net-
worlt OI IVIIII Ichlxmrds and “bl

Wsretgmﬁlectric

n'unhkl— In

Gra

IIIGTII

(II-"AI"

drum/hr

 

 

Figure 23: Western Electric advertisement that

appeared In Collier's: The National Weekly
(October 13. 1928).

LM

 

 

 

 

 

. . . via Western Electric

' I ‘HE goes on the
air through the well-known Western
Electric c"micI-orgyhonc and broadcrming
cquipm into your
lhrmgh ther Western Electric N o 560—A. W'
loudspm
VOiWIIlLe up your radio with this mu

5
a

V013: It tell you of the wonderful things
there are int cnir— inguy nod
Iulpcunn and cannot enjny until you have

It loudspeaker Ilmt hrInus them [(I )ou,
in ever) delicate tune from the hinhut,
sheen-s violinot tremol u to the cepcs
iullut 'ccllu

Hr" Uundn quality Is inherent In Ihit
Western Electric loudspeaker. It Is part
of: 50-yea ear old Ira iuon covering: a
“hole lamily of related producu In the
E: 1 Incl communication, inrlud in g the
naiion'l millions n! telephones and net-
work of switchboards and ables.

Waretgwglecrric

Dam/tum! II

Gra

Inc!“

bTiR

tounuuv

TM nlbarr'uJ Jm/m «min-n

 

Figure 23: Western Electric advertisement that

appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly
(October 13. 1928).

 

89

 

 

   

0" JIIS'I‘ “SW
'I‘IIIS GIFT WILL III! APPRECIATE”

 

IIuII ..II II... III..I . ..I. ...... In. IIIII MI]! On!” I..."
......un, ....IuIII. III... ....I ' 11... as...
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«III-l. nanlIIr-III IIIIII Il— up“ "l‘l'll
I. um) Ium ._.. urOIri-l-p-vln
...... ...I... ... .III._I ....I ..II II. I” II. I...
nl ll allrl I‘m‘ the Ii

 

14h». .In-IIII ...... I... Iran I... .III.. ......
lrﬂl’dlhr Mdrn'l'll' p‘mlII-r-
...-I i-I-Inun - Il‘hlrr IluI .l-n- lulu.

   

 

50": i- Ilue 11mm. - Alllumlllr Lulu-I
' AJIInlIIIiI. lllnrliir Inn nmIn—i- [In [ml ‘ V mm“ "It:
i. Iluu-L-Imerlu uII;hInl lam» III-..- _ _ ”I u“ “ml IL. “1"; “III!
I .I I
I Thur?!" Aul-Inulif lid-In. m I. h- In
any... III Inn-unu- .'n........7. ‘
“III-n nude ”In Stimulant] III». .I. ,III. "‘ "|'"";\F"”I I'lh'ﬁr-"h‘u 4" (rh-
llnp'n Fur] 11...: I» M who I, mm “mm" or; Ian“ .... '11 r run-"d c..- .
harry“ ......I. -- I. - I..I..., .....I... I. II...“
hwm i»... ...-AM -I...I..I. ......III-IIImIII. I...I.I.I. ......I I'"'“' " " "' "L ‘3” ”-
.. .. II- .... ....I—n A. II..." dr-Im ”...-II. .4...
hhmIImnIInIIIm‘m...’ III... 11.... I... II... 4.30 III...“ Am..-
”' "“"""“’"" le~ 3.. \...II. I.

 

‘Tr-II uh I... Midi-p
i
TH 0 EN
ulilS -M¢l&
IT A (LWAYS ll 6 "TS

   
 
 

“...... I..I.....
s.—

  

r...

 

 

 

Figure 24: Thorens Inc. advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (November 24. 1928).

90

 

IN NEXT WEEK'S COLLIER'S

AT SEA

The good ship Delkirk sails next week and before
she docks, three weeks hence, you will have been
piloted through the mazes of a ﬁrst’cabin mys’
tery story

By William (O’Brien I

 

 

 

 

Figure 25: Advertisement for the book At Sea by William
O’Brien that appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly
(December 29, 1928).

91

 

 

 

1. ' . . a t “'AHIL1|I”~I'I,Etllla7 . a g .

 

( ollu-r'. 1' Ii. 1. n

“...BUT YOU WOULDN’T
(lure PRINT THAT!

\ ...-m..." .-.—i I. all ...-v pd.
- n.

Inab- . Alrﬂnllr «on... ..I «... .mpwn-

u- run. In -- mllnl ‘IH' ...] Hum-4"

m\ulh--u.n.h.m . . . Inn—1...”.
.u- a . .
n-plhhnl. m .Ium L...» II- mun m ....
[lo-null-IW-E-Inl.

A m...- u. u. nun-«.1 an...— n, unuw um
um mu lb! a." ...: ...I—I -m..

‘l-ln-ul-g. n—‘u m 1.“. . nu nu- Ila-annul- a
u- ..u n. [until I._., a... .1

rum-r“

-‘—u.n and ‘h, ..u um.“ I|\t\[_«
pm. nylM-l murmur n..- u—I. -. .....I

I; nun-— ....» ... n... n... ...... mm»
lung...“ u b ...: ...—um. u... mun-u.
“I. I. I...- .... a...“ nun. Id. r1 a.
.1. u! m ..‘n "4.- n.-

III-II:

"laud—J I-Ilnbl I. ammo-r -
nun. nnkl- I. .- ml, I... .1 “mm. lul.
wax

pul- . . . C D. Cam '1“ 1 lb
:- .. n...—
[Del-um . . . Inlhl‘h.‘r.G-I_u
S; 1.
land. '1“: sun... u... mu. run-r "n.
'bh—ln-Ih'ﬂn'WI-l-lm'
'lb rlﬁﬂll—hlkm".
Mmkh-mn—ltym—
Mun-I- uvlnvi “ninth—-
Hal ......x I. T;
....I. ...I .u-mI—n—I. lull-pa — I- A"
Lunch-- 4 sud-n pun-d l— u- I—
updr-vullhmnmm
nub-bMd—u—dmvmya—n
mun. n... ...... h m. [...-duh. :-

ﬁnd
h.-‘m7-uA-ynbu-,-_|-nnld
“maul—...}

...uml-mn-mohky-n-ni—q
«Mahmud-ammuni-
'mfnuﬁl—uﬁllr.C-I_h-D
.../..HmnV-le—M—pﬂho
“a Ink—h,-

'DILIIIIID Iln‘TIIL' AT vunurnow nl 1n: [\IYI‘II unl- Ell-III or colllltl

NATloN’S BUSINESS
‘5:

More llmu 300.000 r'irrululiun

 

 

Figure 26: Nation’s Business advertisement that
appeared in Collier's: The National Weekly
(July 6, 1929).

 

92

 

IIF. "......PIII IIFIIIIJ.

IIIIIIII II I ..IIIIIIII- I-II IIIII.

 

>- \ "IIIIIII II III III-III. ..I IIIIIII‘I-III III II... IIII

I...I.II...IIIIII IIIIIIIII II “..I... I. ..III. .I.“...II

 

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IIIII Iral IIII.

IIIIIIIIIII

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[III-
"III?" ...I. III "In .I....II Ill IIIIII I I.I.I.

 

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Inn-lib“. I...

-~I...I..I \II. “.I. , In 7III. . III.II. III-III;

 

I...IuIIIIIIII. II." .I.. II ..IIIIIII... IIIIIIIIII IIIIIII
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIII I...II.I.~III..I I. III-II III-IILIIIIIII

IIIJIIII-J' ..II nu... IIII.III.nI ..II III... .I..

II. .IIIIplIIIIIIIII... um. I.. ......II
I—r Ilr IIIp-rnnl lIuI du—

III ~I.II< I... . .IIIII III I"... ..I

   

III IIIIIIIIn. \I IIIII .. I... III...
I

.nI‘uI

"I II"... .III

   

 

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I... .....IIIIII

--I.I..III.I. III I‘D". \II II.” I... Ira-III. "Ir
III

 

 

IIIII' I .II...I

   
 
 

IIIIJIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII II‘..." .I III.

I
IIIIIIII II.

 

   

III-II IIIIIIIII IIIIII III.I.

       

 

.I\IIIIIII III II I I.

     

   
 

.I....
I III....II..I I. I. III IIIIIII IIIIIII IIIIIII-
L . ..

 

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I. I.. ..I II...
..I.

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III-II“... I.II. I...I III. "..I... IIIIIIIIII
| I

 

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III, I. .I.. III ......III

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III iIIIIIII. II...

     
  

 

III. IIIIIIII. I... I

on
I. II. III... III... III, I. I-II.
l

I
II..- III. I. .I.. .I..

 

 

III II ”..I \I J J II... L-JI‘

 

II... I II. II II. IIIII I.

'III... III... ..II. II.. .I.. ......IIIIIII. I..IIII.
u

 

 

. I... IIILII I... III.
III "I... II-IIII..." IIIII" III.I IIIII IIII IIIII

 

 

 

 

I..I IIII II. ...IIIIIIIIIIIII. III..."
I III I.... IIIIIII. I. II. II

I..I ,IIII I uh" ..I. I IIIII III”... I... III-

I ......I..I.III.I.IIIIIIIIIII.III III nun"...

   

NATIﬂN’S BUSINESS

AsuIMIIoV III

'II‘ILIsuzo uouI‘IlI-V ” ‘ IHI. l VITIID ~I'IIL9 LIIAMIIEII OI tonal-(1

More lIIIm 300,000 I'ircululiou

. MIIIII TIHHKI'I. run." 0 a .

   

 

Figure 27: Nation’s Business advertisement that
appeared in Collier’ s: The National Weekly
(August 10, 1929).

 

..-\-M"‘ ’N

93

 

 

 

( ollII-rk I... .IIIIIIIIIII u. rm

 

Take Avian in". for Instance . . .
“:‘I \ II.... I- .- .IIII I |.II- .I.. “ I \-I-IIII III-In IIIII HIIIHI."-II'IIIII IIIIIIIIIII."

“......IIII. I... III ... .I.. .I....I... \I.I.I......II

  
 

   

 

NATION’S BUSINESS

I" .
Hull”, ‘l‘,\|”.‘ ‘. ‘\~||1\IIIU\ III I“"I Illl |\II|I| ~IIII- Ill\\llllll III IIIIIIIIIIII

MIIrI- IIIIIII 300.000 I'irrnluliun
I

 

 

Figure 28: Nation’s Business advertisement that
appeared in Collier's: The National Weekly
(September 14, 1929).

-‘A_-‘,-_

 

J‘

 

 

r-m-u m o.-
l—fnnl by

m

I
‘
7
Y
j
i

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 29: Bendix Aviation Corporation advertisement that appeared in
Collier’s: The National Weekly (July 27. 1929).

95

 

 

Collier'l I- Ann-II". I-

 

In bound laconic. "S'I-ndl Ml Thea-II mm who [nu 'III m an
Mylo-we milrl Iran [III-r ooh IIIIII IIII IIIIIIIr. III' I‘
... hour on u), “but“. hm... . .m IryIIIu IIII \lll Hm I Im— II! Iu\|- I-rn
bum mm In Ami- rill-In IIIII WIIII IIII IIII Illll Hm” I" IIII-h
m”, .m m... c“, "In...“ IMIII II.-I IMIIII ..I. II III
I I . III-I IIII ‘ﬁll‘ln In»
I . . drvumluul u. III-II- Inlrr mum Ihll ll
'“f‘ “h “"d' "' "“"t P'“""““ In. ..I In... .I run! .I.... "I III...

mm In 'orllnn mu In men
come {III-In nﬂlc Im of un-
HIeI- Iii ly— I-rrcnI IIhe
untimely Ie-rinl-upol‘upuulve
Inst.- u-l sum-ll Iran annual.
'IIlI cal-alum: «tannin-add]!
dell”. . .

In I

NINE In [Inuit-(ml; In an Ind
min Ion-lull.

;

"I! in.“ In“ lad-y.

'rI_. ......me
PHI-ieranIn-U 1m... 1'16!
LII.»-

lllll I‘ml lull inn lu
[III I «III ury- lllll I"!

ll Inr [III-y qu
Inn In lmliing
rnrri n—Ilul nu mm

:51! [In lqudml III-I M" yum I'm!

still In

Thu-Coal. lrmI I'ipr "NIR'II Avo-
dalm- nll'm mInplrII- IIII‘IIIIIIIIIInn on

CAST
IRON
PIPE

-—- sou—mm

 

 

IIIIII-IoII-m imlIII-Ie—f. In.
-,II-r "rm mul “when: Ind la-
Illnl Irul II II\ 'l'lI nfol'lnuiu i
III’HIIIFII [or lh! nIlIiIIIl. Add”:
TlIr (uI lmu I‘ll-r

In.n'l'ln Inn I“. “elk. “much
En "nine". I” So ulh Mlchnm
An- noe. Chin-an.

nculmﬁIl—Il—O‘n

inn-Iain: [bulb

 

Figure 30: Cast Iron Pipe advertisement that appeared in

Collier’s: The National Weekly (September 7 . 1929).

 

96

 

 

  

ENGINEER

 

looks into the FUTURE

 

'U_n
rnZ—I

RO
lP

 

 

Figure 31: Cast Iron Pipe advertisement that appeared
in Collier's: The National Weekly (October 5. 1929).

97

 

 

.- ' .-. 0 c
. ~ I .:.eg
[2

Ir ,; ,
I I llllllthzappy

[Me “IllIlll' s A RIAS‘DI‘"

\

q..._\..._,.II ".44....
:a... I~,. ... Hm. ..I

   
 
    

 

 

. .
........I ....III .I . .I.... IIIII "..IIIIII ..
\I II..
‘1 I I I II I
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7221:???
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I‘- nuull .I-AIIV u I\- link Fit-L “J?
, 3--.. -._. _._..
1 c- uls —~ M,
’ ‘ ..Vv, ,

bUl/ if fadal/ for break/as! fomorrow ..I... 2272‘: "::"'-

-::Ilh\~‘—.

 

Figure 32: Postum Company. Inc. advertisement that
appeared in Collier’s: The National Weekly
(February 8. 1930).

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

 

 

 

 

 

98

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Abrams, Ann Uhry. “From Simplicity to Sensation: Art in American
Advertising, 1904- 1929.” Journal of Popular Culture 10 (Winter 1976):
620-628.

“Art with the Appeal of a Bullﬁght.” Collier's: The National Weekly
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