PM and A-D: Volume 6, Nos. 1 – 6
Oct. – Nov. 1939 to August – Sept. 1940
An Intimate Journal For Art Directors, Production Managers, and their Associates
Robert L. Leslie and Percy Seitlin [Editors]
Six issues of PM / A– D complete with original covers and all inserts bound into a single decorated cloth volume by the craftsmen at the Composing Room in an edition of 400 copies. Blue cloth boards with leather gilt spine labels. Printed Publishers Index for Volume 6 bound in. Blue spine cloth slightly darkened, leatherette label etched, and all four tips nudged. Textblock lightly dust spotted. All six bound issues in fine condition in a very good Publishers binding.
A one-stop opportunity to own a collection of PM / A-D as it became the leading journal for American Graphic Design and a clarion for the Avant-Garde Immigration to the United States.
[Frank Lieberman] Robert L. Leslie and Percy Seitlin [Editors]: PM [An Intimate Journal For Art Directors, Production Managers, and their Associates]. New York: The Composing Room/P.M. Publishing Co., Volume 6, No. 1.: October-November 1939. Original edition. 12mo. Thick printed wrappers. 84 pp. Illustrated articles and advertisements. Four-color photo-offset wrappers designed by Frank Lieberman (Featured Artist).
[Herbert Bayer] Robert L. Leslie and Percy Seitlin [Editors]: PM [An Intimate Journal For Art Directors, Production Managers, and their Associates]. New York: The Composing Room/P.M. Publishing Co., Volume 6, No. 6: December 1939- January 1940. Original edition. 12mo. Perfect-bound letterpressed wrappers. 108 pp. Illustrated articles and advertisements. Original 2-color letterpress cover design by Herbert Bayer.
[György Kepes] Robert L. Leslie and Percy Seitlin [Editors]: PM [An Intimate Journal For Art Directors, Production Managers, and their Associates]. New York: The Composing Room/P.M. Publishing Co., Volume 6, No. 3: February-March 1940. Original edition. Slim 12mo. Perfect bound and sewn printed wrappers. 108 pp. Illustrated articles and advertisements. One of the finest issues of PM. Cover collage design by Howard W. Willard, printed via 4-color photo gelatine.
[Joseph Binder] Robert L. Leslie and Percy Seitlin [Editors]: PM [An Intimate Journal For Art Directors, Production Managers, and their Associates]. NYC: The Composing Room/P.M. Publishing Co., Volume 6, No. 4: April-May 1940. Original edition. Slim 12mo. Photographically printed perfect bound and sewn wrappers. 56 pp. Illustrated articles and advertisements. Multiple paper stocks. Original 4-color photo offset cover design by Joseph Binder.
[NYC WPA Art Project] Robert L. Leslie and Percy Seitlin [Editors]: A-D [An Intimate Journal For Art Directors, Production Managers, and their Associates]. NYC: The Composing Room/P.M. Publishing Co., Volume 6, No. 5: June-July 1940. Original edition. Slim 12mo. Stitched and perfect-bound two-color wrappers. 61 [15] pp. Illustrated articles and advertisements. Wraparound cover design 3-color lithographed in the Graphic-Tone Process by Featured Artist Maurice Freed.
[Irvine Kamens] Robert L. Leslie and Percy Seitlin [Editors]: A-D [An Intimate Journal For Art Directors, Production Managers, and their Associates]. NYC: The Composing Room/P.M. Publishing Co., Volume 6, No. 6: August-September 1940. Original edition. Slim 12mo. Thick printed perfect bound and sewn wrappers. 57 [7] pp. Illustrated articles and advertisements. Multiple paper stocks. Original 2-color photo offset cover by Featured Artist Irvine Kamens. Wrappers lightly edgeworn with a couple of faint scratches. A very good or better copy. [6] 5.5 x 7.75 volumes with 496 pages of articles and trade advertisements. Issue highlights include:
- Herbert Bayer: 32 pages written and designed by Bayer, with four pages of wax-paper overlays to illustrate Bayer's composition theories. Three articles authored by Bayer in the early thirties are published here for the first time in English: 'Contributing Towards Rules of Advertising Design;' 'Fundamentals of Exhibition Design;' and 'Towards a Universal Type' are printed in their entirety. 53 photos, illustrations, diagrams and reproductions are in the Bayer section alone. This edition of PM is an amazing original example of Bauhaus Graphic Design and its influence on American modern design. The 1939 publication date mark this as an early representation of the Bauhaus immigration to America.
- György Kepes by L. Moholy-Nagy with layout by György Kepes: 16-page insert on György Kepes, including a one-page original introduction by Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. This the first American article to showcase the efforts of Kepes, and includes work samples of photograms, advertising and magazine covers. Kepes also contributes an illustrated essay entitled The Task of Visual Advertising.
- Joseph Binder: 16-page insert on Austrian poster artist Joseph Binder (printed in 4c offset). This the first American article to showcase the efforts of this legendary poster artist. Includes samples of his poster work for the 1939 New York Worlds Fair, Ballantine Beer, Travel Posters and magazine covers.
- ART AND THE MACHINE: 16-page insert featuring streamline product and packaging designs of Society of Designers for Industry members Clarence P. Hornung, Egmont Arens, George Blow, Clarence Cole, Thomas D'Addario, Frank Gianninoto, Francis Goldsborough, Bond Morgan, William O'Neil, Frederic H. Rahr, Martin Ullman and Georges Wilmet. The insert was designed by Hornung and is jaw-dropping beautiful, with some of the most beautiful photo engraving you will ever see.
- 29 Prints by Graphic Artists of the NYC WPA Art Project: presented by Lynd Ward. Includes a 3-page text introduction by Ward (former Supervisor Graphic Arts Division New York City WPA Art Project) followed by 29 full-page b/w offset reproductions of work by Ida Abelman, Harold Anchel, Carlos Anderson, Dayton Brandfield, Louis Breslow, Ruth Chaney, Harry Gottlieb, Riva Helfond, William Hicks, Ben Hoffman, Eli Jacobi, Jacob Kainen, Anne de Kohary, Joe Leboit, Russell T. Limbach, Louis Lozowick, Nan Lurie, Clara Mahl, Beatrice Mandelman, S. L. Margolies, Elizbeth Olds, Leonard Pytlak, Julia Rogers, I. J. Sanger, Saul, Harry Shokler and Hyman Warsager.
- Howard W. Willard: 15-page insert with layout by Howard Willard and letterpress printed.
- Howard Willard's Collage by Herbert Bayer: one-page essay
- PM Presents the Art Squad: cover by Alex Steinweiss and layout by Seymour Robbins
- Maurice Freed: 8-page insert lithographed in the Graphic-Tone Process.
- Posters for the London Underground
- William Sharp: 16 pages of gravure prints.
- Fritz Eichenberg
- Lucien Bernhard’s Photo Magnetic Lettering Service: Stunning 16-page, 2-color insert designed by Bernhard.
- Irvine Kamens
- Jean Carlu
- Artist as Reporter: featuring b/w art by PWA/Ashcan-era artists Frank DiGioia, Tom Funk, Lyle Justus, Victor Candell, and Don Freeman. Freeman's contribution is a full-page drawings of Orson Welles in the make-up chair being transformed into Charles Foster Kane.
- Advertisers include: The Composing Room, Mergenthaler - Linotype Co., American Type Founders, Ralph C. Coxhead Corp., Reliance Reproduction Co., Wilbar Photo Engraving, Strathmore Paper Co., Flower Electrotypes, Duenewald Printing, Horah Engraving Co., Longmans, Green and Co., Worthy Paper Co. Assoc., Ludlow Typograph Co., Whitehead V. Alliger Co.
- PM/A-D Shorts mention: Howard Black, Lester Beall, Stewart H. Rae, School of Design, Chicago, L. Moholy-Nagy, Daniel Berkely Updike, Miguel Covarrubias, Walter Baermann, Clayton Whitehill, The Art Director's Club, The Composing Room, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Sascha Mauer, T. M. Cleland, Herbert Roan, First issue of Print magazine released, Georges Schreiber, Adolph Dehn, The Pres of the Wooly Whale, Otto W. Fuhrmann, Norman Vogel, the AIGA,George F. Trenholm, Herbert Bayer , William Favell Greenfield, Stanley Brown, William Metzig, Emery Gondor, Doris Sherwood Egbert , W. A. Dwiggins, Lucien Bernhard and Lester Beall.
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.
György Kepes (1906 – 2001) was a friend and collaborator of Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. Also of Hungarian descent, Kepes worked with Moholy first in Berlin and then in London before emigrating to the US in 1937. He was educated at the Budapest Royal Academy of Fine Arts. In his early career he gave up painting for filmmaking. This he felt was a better medium for artistically expressing his social beliefs. From 1930 to 1937 he worked off and on with Moholy-Nagy and through him, first in Berlin and then in London, met Walter Gropius and the science writer J. J. Crowther. In 1937, he was invited by Moholy to run the Color and Light Department at the New Bauhaus and later at the Institute of Design in Chicago. He taught there until 1943. In 1944 he wrote his landmark book Language of Vision. This text was influential in articulating the Bauhaus principles as well as the Gestalt theories. He taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1946 to 1974 and in 1967 he established the Center for Advanced Studies. During his career he also designed for the Container Corporation of America and Fortune magazine as well as Atlantic Monthly and Little, Brown.
Joseph Binder's poster work used simple compositions and geometric patterns derived from Cubist and DeStijl principles. In 1924 he won the poster design for the Buro des Festes, Vienna. He emigrated to the United States in 1934 and was influential in developing the pictorial graphic design style of the 1930's and 1940's. In 1939 he designed the poster for the New York World’s Fair. His success in the US was further increased by winning many poster competitions organized by the Museum of Modern Art, for such agencies as the National Defense, the United Nations and the American Red Cross. He also designed covers for Fortune and Graphis Magazine. After 1950 he was art director for the US Navy Department in Washington, DC.
Clarence P. Hornung studied at City College and at Columbia University. He was a designer for American Type Foundry and a member of the Society of Designers for Industry in New York City. In addition to designing several hundred trademarks, package designs and industrial designs, he designed book bindings for such clients as Harper’s, Metropolitan Museum of Art, H. Wolff, Limited Editions Club, Encyclopedia Britannica, Heritage Press and DuPont.
Irvine Kamens (1912 - 1955) was born in Russia, and arrived in the United States at the age of 5. He studied at the Pennsylvania School of Fine Arts. He went to New York in 1931 and was associated for a time with the American Bauhaus Group. He was art director for Lester Russin Associates and worked for such clients as Lederle Laboratories, WABC, Continental Can Corporation and Imperial Wallpaper. He was a contibutor to Life and Fortune as well as Men’s Wear and The Reporter. During World War II he worked in London for the American Office of War Information creating posters for the Psychology Warfare Division in Europe.
Jean Carlu originally began training as an architect but turned to commercial art after an accident cost him his right arm. During the 1920’s and 1930’s he was a leading figure in French poster design. In 1937, he was chairman of the Graphic Publicity Section of the Paris International Exhibition. He came to the United States to organize an exhibition at the New York World’s Fair, for the French Information Service. He remained here when Paris was captured by the Germans. It was during his time in the US the he designed one of his most famous posters - America’s Answer! Production This poster won him a New York Art Directors medal as well as being voted poster of the year. He also designed work for Container Corporation of America and Pan American Airways.
PM magazine was the leading voice of the U. S. Graphic Arts Industry from its inception in 1934 to its end in 1942 (then called AD). As a publication produced by and for professionals, it spotlighted cutting-edge production technology and the highest possible quality reproduction techniques (from engraving to plates). PM and A-D also championed the Modern movement by showcasing work from the vanguard of the European Avant-Garde well before this type of work was known to a wide audience.