Table Of ContentA COURSE OF STUDY IN ADVERTISING DESIGN
FOR UNIVERSITY STUDENTS
A Project
Presented to
the Faculty of the School of Education
Qhe University of Southern California
In Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree
Master of Science in Education
fry
Jack D. Stoops
June 1950
UMI Number: EP46599
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This project report, written under the direction
of the candidate’s adviser and approved hy him,
has been presented to and accepted by the Faculty
of the School of Education in partial fulfillment of
the requirements for the degree of Master of
Science in Education.
Date.......................................................................
Adviser
Dean
The illustrations and arrangement
of the exhibits in this project, par
ticularly the bleeding and the use of
color, are hereby approved*
PRONITS PIECE
INTRODUCTION
Nov/ is the time to establish first rate training for
students of advertising art on the university level. The
struggle to accomplish this end is now being waged and needs
every assistance to gain successful status, recognition, and
support. Tbe professional aims must be stated clearly, and
the rightful position of advertising design in art education
must be presented strongly.
Trends. The whole nature of the aims of university
education is undergoing a change to include curriculum that
will be of practical value to its student body. This is not
to way that the university is becoming a glorified trade
school. It is not. The change is more in the nature of a
stirring out of a long and deep academic lethargy, and a
growing awareness of the currents and movements going on in
the world that supports these great institutions.
Social Aim. There is danger and disillusionment in an
art program on any educational level that does not recognize
social utility, and in which a maladjusted artist is likely
to be produced. This problem confronts us in designing the
art program for the university student who is apt to become
intently absorbed in an isolated and completely introspective
consideration of his art. We must take positive steps to
combat this possibility and try to eliminate all tendency
toward capsule thinking. (An art educator acquaintance in
England ably called it "water-tight compartmentarianismfl.)
i i i
John Dewey in his Democracy and Education describes the
pitfall accurately when he says:
The very word art may become associated not
with specific transformation of things, making
them more significant for mind, but with stimu
lation of eccentric fancy and with emotional in
dulgences* The separation and mutual contempt
of the "practical” man and the man of theory or
culture, the divorce of fine and industrial art
are indications of this situation* The same con
ditions force many people back upon themselves*
They take refuge in an inner play of sentiment
and fancies* They are aesthetic, but not artistic,
since their feelings and ideas are turned upon
themselves, instead of being methods in acts which
modify conditions* Even the pursuit of science may
become an asylum of refuge from the hard conditions
of life - not a temporary retreat for the sake of
recuperation and clarification in future dealings
with the world*
In many ways the foregoing description fits the tradi
tional pattern of the university, and throws into sharp relief
the awakening that Is stirring in many a hallowed hall*
University art departments are slow to accept this re-direc-
tion, but some encouraging steps have been taken* Until v/e
manage to design our whole curriculum in tune with the hard
conditions of life, our art training program Is incomplete
and a fraud. For the primitive man and the child, art is
not extraneous and removed from life, but rather an intensi
fication of life* Art is regarded by primitive man as so
important that its use is socialized; and an artist for art’s
sake would probably have been killed as a dangerous devil,
but an artist for the communityfs sake became a priest and a
king* Let us become the priests and kings of our day by teach
ing art as a practical pursuit.
Iv
Art vs. Fine Art. This presents the whole problem of
the arts in a new light. Academicians love the distinction -
"Fine” and ,fApplied” art - they cling to it as though it were
a healthy new idea instead of an ancient Renaissance one.
Before the Renaissance, the so-called ,fFine Arts” (architec
ture, sculpture, painting, poetry, and music) were not ex
plicitly named nor distinctly recognized as a separate class;
even in classical Greece there was only one word, "tokhne”
for both kinds of art. This unfortunate schism has flourished
until the advent of the industrial revolution. The incongruity
of the position, and the application of "tasteful” decoration
on machine made produc ts has at last become evident, and a new,
emancipated, structural art is evolving, unfettered by the
chains of the traditional.
Integration. Since we believe that education deals
with modifying and changing human behavior for the better
rather than with just cerebral gymnastics, then we have an
excellent case for the arts - especially those tagged by
Renaissance thinking as the Applied Arts, a lesser category
than those so-called Fine Arts. The tongues that clack the
loudest at the low level of public taste are usually the
tongues that speak of art in revered, removed tones - reaching
always the same audience which essentially agrees with the
Fine Arts attitude already, thus perpetuating the market for
the cheap and shallow. Fortunately, creative thinking in the
20th century has begun to think the Applied Arts into their
V
rightful high status among the Arts* No distinction should
be made* It is interesting that we are approaching a re
integration of the arts - a family reunion and a social re
union. Perseverance will be needed if this integrating
process is to flourish because there are persistent, tradi
tional, academic voices raised in the interest of research
and history that condemn the practical arts* Other cultural
snobs scorn the practical arts as lacking purity of creative-
ness. There are figures of influence in university education
circles who question the inclusion of advertising art in the
University Art curriculum. Banish it to the trade and art
schools - too much compromise with the creative spirit is en
countered In advertising design] To call it a compromise to
adapt art to a practical need seems to be a symptom of with
drawal of a most serious nature - what value is pure creativi
ty? What value to himself or society is the rigid, uncom
promising personality? We recognize him as an ill, maladjusted
person and recommend psychiatric treatment to reintegrate him
in society.
Influence. The Idea that the advertising designer is in
complete contact with business is a revolting thought to the
ivory tower boys. Some of their revulsion of course is jus
tified - advertising certainly can be a coarse and ugly mon
ster. In Chapter 9 of The Mature Mind Professor Harry A.
Overstreet discusses this aspect of public contact.
Pour influences continually at work in the shaping
of our character are newspapers, radio, movies, and
advertising. We need now to ask the psychosocial
vl
question whether the influence of these has, in the
main, been for or against our maturing. Advertising
is the nation1s biggest business. It is also one
of the biggest and most continuous psychological
influences in our lives. Advertising halts our
psychological growth to the extent that it makes
us do too much wanting and makes us want things
for the wrong reasons.
Responsibility. Advertising art as a means of communica
tion reaches directly into millions of personsf lives daily
through many media - on busses, street cars, billboards
placed strategically at important traffic intersections, in
window display, newspaper ads, magazine ads, motion pictures,
television programs and brochures. Unless you are a hermit
its Influence is inescapable. Thus, it has a real responsibili
ty, and advertisers are slowly coming to this awareness. Of
course, the central aim is to sell the product visually - and
this has led to blatant and offensive examples, a distinct
air of irresponsibility, and, all too often, an appeal to
the coarse and base in human nature. Gan this pattern be
changed?
The Solution. Now arises the problem of the best way in
which to combat these unhealthy and crass influences. One
very important aveune is the training of our advertising de
signers, who will exercize a refining influence upon all they
are called upon to design. Theirs is a very precarious course,
and calls for the best of tact and a truly broad background
not only in the arts, but in writing, psychology, history, and
business education. The advertising designer must navigate
a course between two reefs, the demogogy of the advertiser
and the esoterism of his own artistry. The business man,
