This dissertation analyzes Associated American Artists, a business that sold American art at affordable prices through department stores, its own mail-order catalogues, and its own galleries. During the period of this study, 1934 to 1945, Associated American Artists’ founder, Reeves Lewenthal, capitalized on several conditions in order to effectively promote the sale of his art, several of which were directly in-line with his own personal beliefs and aspirations. These conditions included the growth of the consumer-driven retail economy evidenced by the popularity of department store shopping in large cities and the success of catalogue shopping across the nation; the need for an uplifting and positive art to calm the fears of those who were hit hard by the effects of the Great Depression; the burgeoning development of color advertisements in popular magazines, often including reproductions of fine art; and the interest of several major industrial corporations in repairing recently-damaged reputations by hiring fine artists to serve their various needs.
Throughout this time period Lewenthal promoted the originality of his firm’s strategies in selling its five dollar signed prints and other artwork, and also the methods of sale he utilized and his collaborations with corporate industry. Many of these corporate commissions resulted in the mass distribution of reproductions of artwork in the form of calendars, corporate literature, and advertisements. This mass distribution had an impact on the public’s reception of the artwork, which, as will be seen, was both positive and negative. I explore these issues and evaluate both the critical and praiseworthy comments made by artists, executives, and critics in order to determine the ramifications of the various corporate programs with which Associated American Artists was involved.
My critical assessment of Associated American Artists is the result of careful study of the firm’s activities as well as a comparison with its predecessors and contemporaries, as described in the secondary literature on the art market in the United States and Europe. The history of advertising, consumerism, and Regionalist art also played a role as I analyzed the relevant literature pertaining to those topics. The dissertation contributes greatly to a clearer understanding of Associated American Artists and its relationship to the social-historical context of the 1930s and 1940s.