Feb 07, 2008 - Sale 2135

Sale 2135 - Lot 55

Price Realized: $ 6,240
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 4,500 - $ 5,500
(ADVERTISING)
Thick album entitled "Americka, Svetelna Reklama" [America, World Advertising] with 46 photographs of neon and illuminated commercial signage in New York City and Chicago, by an unidentified Czech photographer. Silver prints, 9 1/2x7 1/2 inches (24.1x19.0 cm.) and the reverse, each mounted on its own leaf and with a typewritten caption, in Czech, below the photograph. Oblong thick 4to, gilt-lettered leather. 1920s
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Additional Details

With Edison's improvement on the incandescent light bulb and its immediate assimilation into the nocturnal commercial landscape of cities throughout the U. S. and Europe, consumer culture was forever changed. The enterprising anonymous Czech photographer who produced these scenes focused on the creative electrical signage affixed to businesses selling everything from Studebakers to beauty culture to lunch. There are a plethora of outdoor scenes, most of them rendering a bold white graphic against the dark background of night, and a handful of interiors, including those featuring trade shows and showrooms dedicated to brilliantly lit signage.


The perennial symbol of this charged graphic environment, Times Square, is depicted as well Macy's and other icons of the American social landscape.


JPGs are available upon request.