The Container Goes Global

Objects of Knowledge
USC Visual Studies Research Institute

Wednesday, March 13, 2013 : 5:00pm to 6:30pm

University Park Campus
Doheny Memorial Library
DML G24, Herklotz Room

Free with RSVP


This paper argues that the 1944 United Nations advertising campaign with the Container Corporation of American positioned the company as a new kind of entity wherein business was wedded to modern art.

Graduate Student: MACKENZIE STEVENS

Department of Art History

Respondent: SARAH BANET-WEISER

Professor, Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism

In 1944, the Container Corporation of America launched a bold, new advertising campaign featuring countries affiliated with the Allied forces. The “United Nations” series was meant to illuminate the company’s role as a facilitator of global enterprise during and after the war. This paper argues that the campaign not only marketed the Container Corporation as a global entity, but that it also positioned the company as a new kind of corporation wherein business was wedded to modern art.

 

Co-sponsored by the Sidney Harman Academy for Polymathic Study and the Visual Studies Research Institute.

Please reply by Sunday prior to the event to www.usc.edu/esvp and enter ESVP code GRAD0313.

Visual Studies Research Institute