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Home > Essays

Essays in Advertising

Engaging essays on a wide-variety of illustration-based subjects by knowledgable authors, scholars, artists, and students can be explored here.

Norman Rockwell: The Rising Tide - Live Webinar

Stephanie Haboush Plunkett | September 13, 2021 - This event is organized by the Appraisers Association. September 20, 2021 | 1:00 - 2:00 PM EST

Constructing New Meaning in Children’s Books: The Work of Faith Ringgold, Jerry Pinkney, and Vashti Harrison

Lee Price | February 23, 2021 - This essay focuses on the ways Black creatives have utilized the medium of children’s books to construct positive imagery, meaning, purpose, and pride.

How Recent Technology Impacts Audiences and Artists: A Study on Social Media and Big Data.

Yuanyuan Zhou | January 13, 2021 - Social media's influence on audience preference of artworks, and how big data inspired artists to create new designs.

Instagram, Illustration, and Internet Connection: The Shift of an Industry and Search for Community Through Visual Imagery Online

Lexi K. Nilson | January 6, 2021 - Modern illustration spills beyond the printed page, and a vast majority of the visual imagery we see and interact with lives on the Internet.

Santa in Illustration

Venus van Ness | December 21, 2020 - Images of Santa Claus in the 1800s do not portray the round, jolly, bearded man that we know today. Throughout the latter half of the 19th century, images of Santa morphed through a variety of looks.

Dan Smith: Rediscovered Star of the World

Alex Bialy | May 27, 2020 - This essay examines the remarkable career of a prolific Golden Age illustrator of full-page Sunday newspaper supplements and painted Western subjects.

Fashion Illustration from the 16th Century to Now

Sarah Goethe-Jones | March 12, 2019 - Fashion illustration not only captures nuance through gesture, but transforms the graphic representation of a garment into an object of desire.

Design and Illustration in the Record Business

Michael Goldstein | August 10, 2018 - An introduction to the designers and illustrators who advanced the importance of album covers and record packaging in the modern music era.

Producing Album Cover Art for Clients in the Music Business

Michael Goldstein | July 19, 2018 - Album covers have benefited from the talents of the people who have worked on them, the tools they had available, and the dynamics of the “Popular Culture” at the time they were created.

Hanna-Barbera: The Architects of Saturday Morning

Jesse M. Kowalski | January 19, 2017 - A history of the world's longest animation partnership, which led the move of animated shorts from film to television and created Saturday Morning Cartoons.

Re-Covering America

Wayne Fields | February 10, 2016 - In post-war America, illustrator Al Parker creates a modern image of women on the covers of national magazines.

Reflecting the Soul of a Nation: Polish Poster Art

Frederick Schneider | July 25, 2015 - The posters created in Poland from the 1950s through the 1980s represent a body of work critically important to the histories of visual communication, graphic design, and illustration.

The Art of Hoarding

| January 10, 2015 - Aubrey Beardsley writes about the relative value of commercial art vs. fine art.

Genres
  • Advertising
    • Corporate
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  • Moving Image
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  • Newspaper
  • Non-Commissioned Work
  • Photography
  • Poster
    • Event (Promotional)
    • Film
    • Political
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  • Product Illustration
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Global Perspectives
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Art Works. National Endowment for the Arts. arts.gov

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"The great band of illustrators have shown us to ourselves and I am proud to be among their company."
- Norman Rockwell

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