Art Advertising

Today I'm showing an advertising piece, offering John R. Neill's services as an illustrator. It's interesting to see what images have been chosen to sell his talent - they're all quite a bit more complex than the Oz work he was doing at this time. This seems to be aimed at advertisers looking for someone capable of creating artwork to sell their products.

The A. Rowden King company was founded around 1920 and located in Manhattan on Broadway. From what I've read, A. Rowden King (1883-1968) was also an editor of the advertising trade journal Printers' Ink, which was a very influential magazine - so it looks like Neill found himself a good representative!

This pamphlet is an accordian-fold piece, reproducing various illustrations. In the picture posted above, the image on the left is the drawing I posted yesterday from Silk Both Sides, published in Century Magazine in 1921. The center image is from From Pillar to Post, published in 1916 by The Century Company, and the beautiful drawing on the right is from Will o' the Mill, published in The Housewife in 1916. The blurb calls out some of Neill's accomplishments, stressing how well his art holds up to reproduction - a mention of his work on the Oz books is also included.

On the reverse side I've only identified one drawing, which is the upper left image of the seated Southern Gentleman - this is also from From Pillar to Post.