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Object Timeline

1930

  • Work on this object began.

1939

  • Work on this object ended.

1975

  • We acquired this object.

2011

2014

2022

  • You found it!

Drawing, Design for Greeting Card, "Vanishing"

This is a Drawing. It was designed by Donald Deskey and drafted by Donald Deskey. It is dated 1930–1939 and we acquired it in 1975. Its medium is brush and gray and black gouache, graphite on white wove paper . It is a part of the Drawings, Prints, and Graphic Design department.

Deskey was one of the leading American industrial designers of the 20th century. His work was strongly influenced by the European Art deco movement, especially after visiting the Paris World Fair of 1925. It was upon returning to America after this event that he became a designer, seeking to bring home some of the innovations he had observed. He is best known for his modernist and streamlined approach to the interiors of Radio City Hall, commissioned in 1930 by John D. Rockefeller, and for his packaging designs which shaped the appearance of American everyday objects from the 1940’s onwards. This greeting card illustrates his purist approach to Art deco, reducing a leaf motif to abstraction. Stylized ovals, straight lines and triangles soberly imitate vegetation in shades of black, grey and white. The diagonals produced by the design cut off the edges of the image, suggesting a larger, broader scale.

This object was donated by Donald Deskey. It is credited Gift of Donald Deskey.

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Its dimensions are

(folded): 24.4 x 16.5 cm (9 5/8 x 6 1/2 in.) Mat: 45.7 x 35.6 cm (18 x 14 in.) Other (full sheet): 24.4 x 33 cm (9 5/8 x 13 in.)

It is signed

Signed in graphite, lower right: BW [?]

Cite this object as

Drawing, Design for Greeting Card, "Vanishing"; Designed by Donald Deskey (American, 1894–1989); USA; brush and gray and black gouache, graphite on white wove paper ; (folded): 24.4 x 16.5 cm (9 5/8 x 6 1/2 in.) Mat: 45.7 x 35.6 cm (18 x 14 in.) Other (full sheet): 24.4 x 33 cm (9 5/8 x 13 in.); Gift of Donald Deskey; 1975-11-57

This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibition Making Design.

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If you would like to cite this object in a Wikipedia article please use the following template:

<ref name=CH>{{cite web |url=https://www-6.collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/18487035/ |title=Drawing, Design for Greeting Card, "Vanishing" |author=Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |accessdate=16 May 2022 |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}</ref>