SVA Archives

November 17, 2017

Department of the Newly Uncovered: Seth Siegelaub’s Artist’s Contract

We just uncovered a batch of Seth Siegelaub’s original Artist’s Reserved Rights Transfer and Sale Agreement from 1971.

June 14, 2016

Underground Images in Warsaw

A survey of SVA subway posters in Warsaw.

February 16, 2016

Delpire

Robert Delpire and Push Pin Studio’s mutual admiration resulted in exhibitions in both New York and Paris.

November 23, 2015

In 1964, SVA’s Visual Arts Gallery hosted the Bettman Panopticon, an exhibition of works by the leading art directors and designers of the day created from materials in the Bettmann Archive, the trove of vintage clip art and photos.

August 04, 2015

65 Self-Portraits

65 Self-Portraits is one of the best documented of the remarkable series of exhibitions organized by Shirley Glaser while she was director of SVA’s Visual Arts Gallery, 1964-1969.

October 09, 2014

Accidents will happen

The tension between the accidental and the controlled is almost always present in the work of George Tscherny.

October 08, 2014

Brilliant mistake

The 1964 course announcement for Henry Wolf’s and Melvin Sokolsky’s photography course at SVA manages to be both instructive and artful, assembling outtakes of the instructors’ portraits in a way that elevates them.

August 29, 2014

Story arc

Milton Glaser got minimal for SVA’s 40th Anniversary logo.

June 26, 2014

Sunday hats

Tony Palladino created this indelible image for an SVA poster in 1989.

February 12, 2014

Significant figures

Milton Glaser’s menagerie of figures for the School of Visual Arts, 1971.

December 17, 2013

Early LeWitt

We love our LeWitt here at Container List, and we recently found some very early exhibition announcements for his work at SVA and other galleries.

November 20, 2013

Working drawings

Milton Glaser’s sketch for the Working drawings and other visible things on paper not necessarily meant to be viewed as art poster became a part of the artwork.

November 12, 2013

To see a fine lady upon a white horse

A 1961 exhibition of the work of the SVA Department of Illustration is a who’s who of the practitioners of the new expressive and painterly illustration of the time.

November 02, 2013

Squigglyman Meets Captain Cross-Hatch

Squigglyman and Captain Cross-Hatch will be back right after they foil Dr. Ugg, who is about to detonate his diabolical Gloomsday Device.

October 25, 2013

Fed up with mediocrity

In 1964, the Sanders Printing Corporation invited SVA’s graduating class to produce its periodic promotional publication, Folio.

October 01, 2013

I can see right through you

Henry Wolf created this School of Visual Arts course announcement for his friend, photographer Melvin Sokolsky.

September 16, 2013

One of these mornings

Labor Day has come and gone, and the Autumn equinox is only a week away; as a send-off to summer, I dug up this charming 1984 promotion for a show at the Visual Arts Museum, featuring a motley assortment of artists—just about everybody under the sun: Fernando Botero, Red Grooms, Alex Katz, Richard Prince, and plenty of others (click through for a list).

September 03, 2013

George Tscherny’s brushwork

This detail for a 1956 poster for the Cartoonist & Illustrators School by George Tscherny. Rebranded as the School of Visual Arts later that year, the designer had a long and fruitful relationship with the institution.