“Know All Men by These Presents”
Today, one from the Golden Age of Illustration…
“Know All Men by These Presents” is a gouache, watercolor, charcoal, and graphite on paper illustration that was made by the American artist, Coles Phillips, circa 1910. It features his signature “fade away girl” art style that he was known for.
For Phillips’ “fade-away” style, he used the negative space in the background and matched it with the objects in the foreground. This allowed the viewer’s mind to fill in the rest of the image. Besides being a really wonderful new style of design, this also saved the magazine a lot of money in publishing costs, so was encouraged by his employers.
“Know All Men by These Presents” is actually a legal term calling attention to some important matter. It is used in tongue-and-cheek here as a woman sits contemplating the gifts of her gentlemen callers which are strewn across her desk and hanging on the wall above her.
“Know All Men by These Presents” appeared on the cover of Life magazine on January 27, 1910.
For more on Coles Phillips, please visit his short biography here.
You can find more artists to learn about here.
