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Posted by: Kristi Finefield
Artists working for the Federal Art Project (FAP), a part of the Work Projects Administration (WPA), created thousands of posters between 1936 and 1943. The posters took on all manner of topics: public health and safety, cultural events and exhibitions, education, tourism, and wartime warnings, to name a few. Only a small percentage of those …
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
Keep Your Teeth Clean. Spare the Trees. Be Careful Near Machinery. Advice dispensed by posters created between 1936 and 1943 for the WPA continues to make good sense today. (WPA first stood for Works Progress Administration, and later Work Projects Administration.) If you are still shopping for New Year’s resolutions, maybe you can turn for …
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
The following is a guest post by Hanna Soltys, Reference Librarian, Prints & Photographs Division. The Work Projects Administration (WPA) Poster Collection is one of the Library’s treasures. We’ve hosted many orientations in person and online about these posters, and this time we’re offering an introduction to the collection during the evening hours! On Thursday, …
Posted in: Posters
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
In a previous Picture This post, Poster Parade: Free to Use-and Animate!, we introduced an exciting collaboration with New York City’s Poster House, the first museum dedicated to the design and history of posters. The Library of Congress provided a selection of Free to Use and Re-Use posters from our extensive, international collections for a …
Posted in: Posters
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
The following is a guest post by Jan Grenci, Reference Specialist for Posters, Prints and Photographs Division. Winter is one of my favorite seasons, what with the snow, and the cookies, and the caroling. There are a number of posters in the collections of the Prints and Photographs Division that illustrate some of the things …
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
“Will you supply eyes for the Navy?” The arresting image of a blindfolded officer at sea, lost and confused, paired with that question, make this an effective poster – the image caught my attention and made me look and read further. This World War I poster is calling for help from the general population in …
Posted in: Photographs, Posters, Series: Caught Our Eyes, World War I
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
A column in The Hartford Courant discussing the decline of letter writing in the U.S. blames “this age of quick communication and rapid transportation.” While this is by no means surprising, the date of the newspaper article might be: Oct. 2, 1938! Yes, even 80 years ago, the art of letter writing was seen to …
Posted in: Photographs, Posters, Prints
Posted by: Kristi Finefield
The following is a guest post by Jan Grenci, Reference Specialist – Posters, Prints and Photographs Division. If you like history and you like pie, this poster could easily become one of your favorites. When Emanuel Leutze finished painting “Washington Crossing the Delaware” in 1851 he probably never imagined his work being adapted for an …
Posted in: Posters, Series: Feast Your Eyes