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Transit Posters from Research: Design in Nature

Today we are featuring poster designs from Research: Design in Nature, edited by John Gilbert Wilkins, published by the Field Museum of Natural History and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1926. The portfolio features over 200 leaves of plates that were printed in the Field Museum pressroom and the Regensteiner Corporation of Chicago. The posters we are presenting today are from a poster competition for students at the School of the Art Institute in 1925.

John Gilbert Wilkins writes:

“Late in the school year of 1925, Mr. D. C. Davies, Director of the Field Museum, decided to offer a second Poster Prize. The contest was open to the second year class in Research of the School of the Art Institute. The director immediately began to cast about to find some available source for securing the necessary prize money to cover the various awards. Mr. Stanley Field, President of the Field Museum, saw the advantage of such a plan and expressed a desire to furnish the required funds. Thus one hundred dollars was set aside for this purpose.

The students were given the necessary data and required to select their own material from anywhere within the Museum, and make preliminary pencil sketches direct from the object. From these sketches poster designs were laid out, also in pencil, criticized and approved by the instructor, then finished in color.”

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