Modern Americanness: The New Graphic Design in the United States 1890–1940

Venturing across five decades of American culture, this landmark book explores how modern graphic design emerged in the United States and how it became an intrinsic feature of the country’s identity. Christopher Long tells this story in a wholly new way, exposing many long-forgotten figures and movements, and resurrecting the debates and conceptions that were integral to the new art. In a series of deeply involving portraits of American artists and innovators who helped shape the very look of the modern age, American Modernness offers a sweeping story of the country’s visual culture and its distinctiveness.

Christopher Long is Martin S. Kermacy Centennial Professor in the School of Architecture at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of more than twenty books, including Lucian Bernhard and Adolf Loos: Meaning, Context, Reception—Essays.