ROAD TO VICTORY
The Museum of Modern Art Bulletin, Volume 9, Nos. 5 – 6, June 1942
Edward Steichen, Carl Sandburg and Herbert Bayer
[Herbert Bayer] Edward Steichen and Carl Sandburg: ROAD TO VICTORY, A Procession Of Photographs Of The Nation At War. New York: Museum of Modern Art, The Bulletin of the Museum of Modern Art, Volume 9, Nos. 5 – 6, June 1942. First edition. Stapled printed self-wrappers. 24 pp. 24 black and white photographs. Wrappers lightly worn. Interior unmarked and clean. Out-of-print. A very goodor better copy of a scarce document.
7.5 x 9.25 24-page stapled bulletin illustrated with 24 black and white photographs. Issued to accompany the Road to Victory exhibition of 1942. "The technical installation has been designed by Herbert Bayer. Although approximately 150 photographs have been used as the basic material, the exhibition is not one of photography in the ordinary sense. Huge, free-standing enlargements, many of them life size or over, are juxtaposed dramatically with one another or with the murals—one of them 12 feet x 40 feet—affixed to the walls." [Museum of Modern Art press release, May 21, 1942]
Of all the artists to pass through the Bauhaus, none lived the Bauhaus ideal of total integration of the arts into life like Herbert Bayer (1900 - 1985). He was a graphic designer, typographer, photographer, painter, environmental designer, sculptor and exhibition designer. He entered the Bauhaus in 1921 and was greatly influenced by Kandinsky, Moholy-Nagy and El Lissitzky. He left in 1923, but returned in 1925 to become a master in the school. During his tenure as a Bauhaus master he produced many designs that became standards of a Bauhaus "style." Bayer was instrumental in moving the Bauhaus to purely sans serif usage in all its work. In 1928 he left the Bauhaus to work in Berlin. He primarily worked as a designer and art director for the Dorland Agency, an international firm. During his years at Dorland a Bayer style was established. Bayer emigrated to the United States in 1938 and set up practice in New York. His US design included work for NW Ayers, consultant art director for J. Walter Thompson and design work for GE. From 1946 on he worked exclusively for Container Corporation of America (CCA) and the Atlantic Richfield Corporation. In 1946 he moved to Aspen to become design consultant to CCA. In 1956 he became chairman of the department of design, a position he held until 1965. He was awarded the AIGA medal in 1970. Bayer's late work included work for ARCO and many personal projects including several environmental designs.