Harper's March
Date1897
Artist
Edward Penfield
(American painter, illustrator, 1866–1925)
Illustration CitationAdvertising poster for Harper's New Monthly Magazine, March 1897
MediumCommercial lithograph
Dimensionssheet: 14 × 19 1/8 in. (35.6 × 48.6 cm)
Credit LineGift of Mrs. J. Marshall Cole, 1973
Object number1973-64
On View
Not on viewClassificationsPRINT
Label TextJudging by the man at the center, with his upturned collar and hands in his pockets, the March weather is cold. The woman in green with her muff seems to look longingly at the horse-drawn carriages, as her escort strides along with downcast eyes. As art director for Harper and Brothers, Edward Penfield designed a series of posters to advertise Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, creating a unified marketing campaign in an easily recognizable style. The posters feature large areas of flat color and depict one or more figures in some sporting or leisure activity, often reading or carrying an issue of the magazine. The escort here holds the magazine, in its signature beige cover, in his hand with his cane. The subjects usually reflect the upper class status of the magazine's readers.
Penfield's posters were popular during the so-called Poster Craze of the 1890s. One critic remarked on the high quality of such works in 1899: "Book and magazine covers, lettering, theatrical bills, advertisements, in fact anything with which the poster could have the slightest affiliation has profited materially. In fact, we are...at this time accustomed to good, strong decorative work in advertising of all sorts..."
