REAL FANTASIES; EDWARD STEICHEN'S ADVERTISING PHOTOGRAPHY.

Johnston, Patricia A. [Edward Steichen, 1879-1973.]

ISBN 10: 0520227077 / ISBN 13: 9780520227071

Published by Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 2000., 2000

xxii, 352 pages. Paperback: H 25.25cm x L 17.75cm. Black paper covers rubbed with minor edge-wear; some wrinkling to spine's surface laminate. Interior pages are clean. Binding is firm. A very good copy. Features ten chapters titled as: "Patronage and Style in Steichen's Early Work;" "The Age of Corporate Patronage: Advertising Accelerates the Demand for Photography;" "From 'Reality' to 'Fantasy' in Early Photographic Advertising;" "Subtle Manipulations: The Persuasion of Realism;" "The Modern Look in Advertising Photography and Product Design;" "The Collaborative Image;" "Testaments to Class Mobility;" "Viewing Fine and Applied Art: The Female Spectator and Advertisements;" "Melodrama in Black and White and Color;" and "Ethnographic Advertising." ISBN 0520227077. Seller Inventory # PXZP-14557

Synopsis:

During the 1920s and 1930s, Edward Steichen was a succesful photographer in the advertising industry. His commercial photography appeared in "Vanity Fair", "Vogue", "Ladies Home Journal" and almost all popular magazines in the US. At a time when photography was just beginning to replace drawings as the favoured advertising medium, Steichen helped transform the producers of small family business products to national household names. In this book, the author uses Steichen's work as a case study of the history of advertising and the American economy between the wars. She traces the development of Steichen's work from an early naturalistic style through to increasingly calculated attempts to construct consumer fantasies. By the 1930s, alluring images of romance and class, developed in collaboration with agency staff and packaged in overtly manipulative and persuasive photographs, became Steichen's stock-in-trade. He was most frequently chosen by agencies for products targeted towards women: his images depicted vivacious singles, earnest new mothers and other stereotypically female life stages that reveal a great deal about the industry's perceptions of and pitches to this particular au

About the Author: Patricia Johnston is Associate Professor of Art History at Salem State College.

Bibliographic Details

Title: REAL FANTASIES; EDWARD STEICHEN'S ...
Publisher: Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 2000.
Publication Date: 2000
Binding: Soft cover