Nineteenth century printmakers Nathaniel Currier and James Merrit Ives knew what America saw when it looked in the mirror. For more than seventy years, Currier & Ives gave back to America the best possible version of itself, idealized views of the young nation to hang in every home. They called themselves “Publishers of Cheap and Popular Prints.” It was the beginning of popular, commercial art on a large scale. Never before had artwork been so readily available and affordable. In a hand-tinted lithograph, the average American could own a printed copy of an original painting. This was new and exciting! This was art for the masses!
So what did Currier & Ives bet the masses would like? Homey scenes, patriotic scenes, scenes of famous racehorses and famous men. Rolling green countryside dotted with fertile farms and graceful city boulevards strolled by fashionable citizens. Pretty ladies courted by handsome gentlemen. Even fluffy kittens (http://www.philaprintshop.com/images/cur4334.jpg). In Currier & Ives’s America, westward expansion speeds toward a glorious future, self-sufficient woodsmen make daring escapes from attacking bears and lifeboats full of survivors are rowed away from dramatically sinking ships. Fruit bowls and flower vases overflow with abundance. In Currier & Ives’s America, every harvest is bountiful, every Christmas is peaceful and snowy.
It wasn’t the first time that an idea of America had been marketed to the public and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. But although Currier & Ives ceased production a century ago, our notions of American identity have been irrevocably shaped by their images. With the keen sense of businessmen, they played on the heartstrings of the American public. Though many of their illustrations come off today as mawkish and sentimental (see: Kittens, above), as a whole they represent some of the ways we saw ourselves a century ago and more. And in their best works we find that our values have not changed so much since then: an appreciation of the natural beauty of the American landscape, the humor in the everyday, and a sense that home and hearth, family and friends are what matters most.
“Home to Thanksgiving” remains the most popular of Currier & Ives’s more than 7,000 prints. Printed in 1867 from a painting by artist George Durrie, it was released to a nation still struggling with the aftermath of the Civil War. In it, Durrie portrayed a peaceful Connecticut farm blanketed with early snowfall. A simple scene, the impact of the image rests with the little group on the farmhouse porch: the farmer and his family reuniting with a grown son (and perhaps the young man’s wife) who has come “home to Thanksgiving.” Without flash or excess, Durrie cuts right to the heart of the holiday: joy and thankfulness for what and who we have in our lives. Some things never change.
Wishing you a Currier & Ives kind of Thanksgiving!
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