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Object Timeline
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1922 |
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1969 |
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1991 |
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1995 |
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2013 |
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Object ID #18468717
This is a Drawing. It was created by Hugh Ferriss. It is dated 1922 and we acquired it in 1969. Its medium is black crayon, stumped, pen and black ink, brush and black wash, varnish on illustration board. It is a part of the Drawings, Prints, and Graphic Design department.
The skyscraper, symbol of New York City and emblem of American culture, is envisioned in this charismatic architectural rendering by Hugh Ferriss, one of a series of four drawings that show how the city's landmark 1916 "set-back" law would produce the stepped architectural silhouette now familiar from iconic structures such as the Waldorf Astoria and the Empire State Building. The limitations imposed on maximum mass were designed to allow light into city streets, and to allay public fears that the new monoliths would turn city streets into canyons of darkness.
This object was featured in our Object of the Week series in a post titled Mod Metropolis.
This object was
donated by
Mrs. Hugh Ferriss.
It is credited Gift of Mrs. Hugh Ferriss.
- Drawing, Study for Maximum Mass Permitted by the 1916 New York Zoning Law,...
- black crayon, stumped; brush and black ink over photostat, varnish on....
- Gift of Mrs. Hugh Ferriss.
- 1969-137-1
- Object ID #18390641
- graphite with fixative on tracing paper mounted on cardboard .
- Gift of Ely Jacques Kahn..
- 1952-15-13
- Hanging, New York Waterfront
- silk.
- Gift of Lydia Bush-Brown.
- 1974-23-6
Our curators have highlighted 8 objects that are related to this one. Here are three of them, selected at random:
- The Street Ahead
- videos.
- MOBILITY.014
- Book Illustration, The Metropolis of Tomorrow, The Chanin Building
- offset lithography, paper.
- Collection of Smithsonian Institution Libraries.
- SIL39088000211581
- Drawing, The Ten-Deck House
- graphite on white wove paper .
- Museum purchase from Smithsonian Institution Collections Acquisition Program....
- 1991-53-2
Its dimensions are
66.8 × 51 cm (26 5/16 × 20 1/16 in.)
It is signed
Signed in pen and black ink, lower right: Hugh Ferriss
It is inscribed
Inscribed in black chalk, verso: #4 (underlined)/Return to Hugh Ferriss/101 Park Ave/New York, NY, USA
Cite this object as
Object ID #18468717; Hugh Ferriss (American, 1889–1962); USA; black crayon, stumped, pen and black ink, brush and black wash, varnish on illustration board; 66.8 × 51 cm (26 5/16 × 20 1/16 in.) ; Gift of Mrs. Hugh Ferriss; 1969-137-4
"Sugar Foot Stomp," Fletcher Henderson and His Orchestra (1925)
The Hugh Ferriss drawing, Study for Maximum Mass Permitted by the 1916 New York Zoning Law, Stage 4 seemed to call out for the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra with Louis Armstrong. In “Sugar Foot...
This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibitions The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920s, Making Design and The Cooper-Hewitt Collections: A Design Resource.
