“Illustrating Tin Pan Alley: From Ragtime to Jazz” and More at The Society of Illustrators

This weekend I had an opportunity to catch an exhibition I’d been wanting to see at The Society of Illustrators, and wound up seeing three, two of which I didn’t know I wanted to see, but it turns out I did. We are a big fan of the place. We’ve previously blogged about their exhibitions of the work of R. Crumb and Drew Friedman, and our post on W.T. Benda shows a mask of his in their collection.

The one I was there to see was Illustrating Tin Pan Alley: From Ragtime to Jazz, a co-presentation of The Society of Illustrators and The Tin Pan Alley Popular Music Project, and is open through October 12. It highlights examples of sheet music art from the collection of Harlem historian John T. Reddick. The title of the exhibition is slightly misleading, although the ensuing description in their marketing materials clarifies: this particular exhibition is narrowly focused on African American imagery, sometimes stereotyped, sometimes celebratory, from roughly 1890 to 1930. (Tin Pan Alley music wasn’t restricted to African American inspiration, either musically or lyrically). That said, there were scores of amazing images to take in, ranging from the charming to the offensive (i.e., so called “coon songs” and other minstrelsy style images.) There are warning labels on the walls, warning labels on the website, and I’m warning you — you’re warned.

Anyway, I saw all kinds of great artist represented. Lots on cakewalk and Williams and Walker (and Aida Overton Walker too); Ernest Hogan; James Reese Europe; Sissle and Blake, Duke Ellington; The Nicholas Brothers; and many more besides. The very cool Harlem nightclub map you see as the background on the sign above was by black artist E. Simms Campbell, the man who designed the top hatted Esquire mascot. I grabbed just a couple of images that struck me.

Liked this one because it speaks to the Salome craze I wrote about here, and the music was by the actual Ed Wynn!

The Castles represented:

And two versions of the same song which I liked, one with Sophie Tucker:

And one with a sort of faceless depiction of a woman of color. Surely the Sheba of Georgia deserves a face!:

As for the two bonus exhibitions: one was on the great Jack Davis, who drew for E.C. Comics, not just Mad Magazine, for which he is most famous, but also the earlier horror comics. It’s open until September 21.

A few images I liked. This once because we just passed the 50th anniversary of Nixon’s resignation:

And this because, ya know, Bob Hope:

And this because of the carny theme:

And the third exhibition was Beautiful Monsters: The Art of Emil Ferris. Ferris the artist who created the critically acclaimed 2017 graphic novel My Favorite Thing is Monsters and its recent sequel. I only snatched one photo from that show, as it reminded me of my recent post on sad clown kitsch:

That show is up through October 18.

Hey, I KNOW my photos are horrible! You wanna see the real thing, go to the Society of Illustrators. All the info is here.