Selling
In the midst of ongoing industrialization, the nation underwent an aesthetic revolution. Middle-class consumers came to appreciate that mass-produced objects of everyday life could be both functional and visually pleasing. In a shopping environment catering to consumer choice, industries and manufacturers of all sorts depended on art and design to make their products stand out.
Vase
Rookwood Pottery Company
Cincinnati, 1885
Gift of Women’s Art Museum Association
Bowl
Grueby Faience Company
Boston, around 1887
From the Marcus Benjamin Collection
Boston, around 1887
From the Marcus Benjamin Collection
Glass Vase
Tiffany Glass & Decorating Company
Queens, New York, 1893-1896
Gift of Charles Lewis Tiffany
Glass jar
Tiffany Glass & Decorating Company
Queens, New York, 1893-1896
Vase
Grueby Faience Company
Boston, Massachusetts, early 1900s
From the Marcus Benjamin Collection
Paul Revere Pottery
Boston, around 1908–1915
Gift of Chas. Frank Ingerson
Vase
University City Pottery
University City, Missouri, 1913
Gift of Anonymous
Petite camera
Eastman Kodak Company
Rochester, New York, 1935
Gift of Geralyn Breig
Camera from Century of Progress Exposition
Chicago, 1933
Gift of Walter Morvay
Beau Brownie camera
Eastman Kodak Company
Rochester, New York, mid-1900s
Gift of Victor H. Garske
Bantam camera
Eastman Kodak Company
Rochester, New York, mid-1900s
Gift of Victor H. Garske
Watch
American Waltham Watch Co.
Around 1893
Gift of Dortha Sanders
Toastmaster electric toaster
McGraw Electric Co.
Minneapolis, 1935-1936
Electric toaster
Knapp-Monarch Co.
St. Louis, around 1941
Gift of Joyce Barth & Florence E. Scuderi
Take a closer look
Notice the gazelle on the Hotpoint tilt-out toaster, so typical of Art Deco styling popular in the 1930s that combined graphical and geometric forms. Advertisements for the toaster attested to its functionality, but—importantly—proclaimed it the company’s “most beautifully designed toaster in over twenty-six years of electric appliance leaders.”
Hotpoint Edison General
Electric Appliance Company, Chicago, around 1932
Gift of Joyce Barth and Florence E. Scuderi
