Limited Collector’s Edition of 1,500 copies
Alex Steinweiss. The Inventor of the Modern Album Cover
Edition of 1,500
Hardcover in slipcase, 15.6 x 13 in., 12.78 lb, 422 pages
US$ 1,000
Art director Alex Steinweiss first created album cover art in 1940 and with it a new art form which would evolve to be as intrinsic a part of pop culture as the music itself. This Collector’s Edition showcases his unique combination of bold typography and elegant illustration which took the industry by storm and revolutionized the way records were sold.
Limited Collector’s Edition of 1,500 copies
Limited Collector’s Edition of 1,500 copies
Music for the Eyes
The man who launched the Golden Age of album cover design
Alex Steinweiss invented the album cover as we know it, and created a new graphic art form. In 1940, as Columbia Records’ new young art director, he pitched an idea: why not replace the standard plain brown wrapper with an eye-catching illustration? The company took a chance, and within months its record sales increased by over 800 percent. His covers for Columbia—combining bold typography with modern, elegant illustrations—took the industry by storm and revolutionized the way records were sold.Over three decades, Steinweiss made thousands of original artworks for classical, jazz, and popular record covers for Columbia, Decca, London, and Everest; as well as logos, labels, advertising material, even his own typeface, the Steinweiss Scrawl. He launched the golden age of album cover design and influenced generations of designers to follow. Less well known—but included here—are his posters for the U.S. Navy; packaging and label design for liquor companies; film title sequences; as well as his fine art. Includes essays by three-time Grammy Award–winning art director/designer Kevin Reagan and graphic design historian Steven Heller; Steinweiss’s personal recollections from an epic career; and extensive ephemera from the Steinweiss archive, most of it never before published.
Alex Steinweiss.
The Inventor of the Modern Album Cover
Edition of 1,500
Hardcover in slipcase, 15.6 x 13 in., 12.78 lb, 422 pages
ISBN 978-3-8365-0192-7
Multilingual Edition: English, French, German
Multilingual Edition: English, French, German