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American

Circus Poster, 1850-1855

Description

Maker

  • Unknown

Culture

American

Title

Circus Poster

Year

1850-1855

Medium

Four-part color woodcut on paper

Materials/Techniques

Materials

  • color ink

Techniques

  • woodcut (process)

Supports

  • Medium weight white wove paper laid down on newspaper

Dimensions

85 x 67.8 cm (33 7/16 x 26 11/16 inches) (irregular)

Type

  • Works on Paper,
  • Prints

Credit

Museum Works of Art Fund

Object Number

44.558.4

Projects & Publications

Publications

Manual / Issue 3

Circus
Read Online

Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Circus

August 1, 2014 - February 22, 2015

This poster depicts the free spectacle of the circus parade, placing on display the carved, painted, and gilded wagon, often the single most valuable object among the circus’s equipment. Upon arriving in a town, performers and animals marched through the streets, allowing spectators to judge the circus’s quality. Circus Day ground progress to a halt—shops closed their doors, schools cancelled classes, and factories shut down, enabling many citizens to attend.

The woodcut’s size and the imprecision in the registration of the print’s various layers of color and tone indicate it was likely adhered to a building and meant to be seen from a distance.

Use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use. This object is in the public domain (CC0 1.0). This object is Circus Poster with the accession number of 44.558.4. To request high-resolution files or new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.

Feedback

We view our online collection as a living documents, and our records are frequently revised and enhanced. If you have additional information or have spotted an error, please send feedback to curatorial@risd.edu.

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