This was a sustained campaign by the company to
define the Future in its own terms. Their product may be utilitarian
but their vision was soaring and an appeal to the old spirit of the New
York World Fair, This is Tomorrow.
The artist whose name and style appears throughout is
Arthur Radebaugh, about whom little as yet is known
(see signature above). A book published by the Palace of Culture (Jared
Rosenbaum and Rachel Mackow) Arthur Radebaugh, the Future we
were promised, is much
anticipated.My selection is dedicated to Laurent Durieux who really
appreciates these things.
The
images define instead the Past in the overall bulginess and chrome
striped whizziness of the Thirties Pulp magazines. Even
the Telephone is moulded for speed and cleaving the air. They leave
nothing to functional design, even the Merry-Go-Round. After c1950
Bohn discarded the hope in the Future for an anti-Communist campaign
addressing the dangers of the present. |