Featured Acquisition: Coles Phillips
Coles Phillips, Know
all men by these presents,
ca. 1910.
Gouache, watercolor and charcoal over graphite
under drawing on illustration board.
Published as cover illustration for Life,
January 27, 1910.
Bendiner Fund Purchase. LC-DIG-ppmsca-01605
catalog
record/rights information |
This drawing represents
an excellent example of Phillips' unique "fadeaway girl," a
design tour-de-force in which he uses negative space brilliantly to compose
a dynamic, innovative, and attractive image in which the main emphasis
falls upon the head and hands of the beauty. In this and other examples,
he depicts the main part of the figure--usually the clothing--so that
it blends into the background.
Coles Phillips (1880-1927) developed his idealistic
portrayals of American women in the early 20th century after the Gibson
Girl appeared. Phillips' Girls graced the covers of Life
magazine, Good Housekeeping, and other magazines, and were
rivaled in popularity and beauty only by those of Charles Dana Gibson
(1867-1944).
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