Essay, Research Paper: Past, Present And Future Of Commercial Art

Commercial art is artwork in a variety of forms created to foster the sale of a product, service, or idea. Commercial art is used in many fields, such as advertising, packaging, publishing, cinema, television, and fashion, textile, interior, and industrial design. Commercial artists use painting, drawing, calligraphy, photography, typography, and most graphic-arts techniques. Their work is often reproduced in print, and many commercial artists are trained in printing techniques. Most commercial artist receives basic training in the background of art before going on to specialize in this field. In this essay we are going over the past, present and future of commercial art.
First off we are going to talk about the past history behind commercial art. It is old as recorded history. Used to be, a commercial artist physically created the drawings and lettering used in a layout. In fact, it used to be, when the layout was carried out. It was a physical paste-up process the artist did him or her self. Computers have changed all that. Signs and painted walls that advertised shops and inns, for example, have been unearthed in the ancient Roman cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii. In the centuries before the development of printing, the vast majority of the public could not read; hence, unmistakable images were created to indicate the nature of the services offered. For example, a pig in effigy adorned a pork butcher's shop, and three gilded balls denoted a pawnbroker. As commerce increased under the stimulus of the Industrial Revolution in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, commercial art followed suit, especially in printed matter. Advertising illustration in copperplate and wood engraving appeared on coach posters, tradesmen's cards, flyers, and newspaper advertisements. The constant developments and improvements in lithography and photoengraving produced a flood of advertising–calendars, billboard posters and catalogs. Late in the nineteenth century improved color reproduction and other advances increased the importance of commercial art and raised its standards.
In the twentieth century, commercial art proliferated at an enormous rate. Now it’s possible to do much of the work on a personal computer or a Macintosh. But that doesn’t mean anyone can do the design and layout work of the commercial artist. It’s still necessary to have artistic training, to understand color, perspective, typography, layout principles, etc. The computer has brought change to the method we use to create commercial art products, but the creative process behind it all remains essentially unchanged and is a function of the talent and training. Along with changing ht methodologies, the computer (especially multi-media and the Net) has expanded horizons for the commercial artist. While once the main career was print, this is now a wide variety of careers available to these artist. Specialists emerged in all fields; advertising agencies were established, offering an infinite variety of commercial art services. The results range from high art to unrelieved vulgarity. In industrial design and the graphic arts, however, commercial art has had its finest accomplishments in bringing outstanding design to the attention of the public. In fact, in the last half of the twentieth century, commercial art has not followed established styles as in the past, but rather has often created and popularized new styles.
In conclusion the past, present and future of commercial art has changed over and over again with each changing time or breakthrough technology that is created. Commercial art is a very broad table of careers that you can choose: Animation, drafting, graphic design and industrial design. Or if more involvement in new technologies is desired, the following fields of work are also possibilities today: Multimedia, video production and web site administration. Commercial will continue to grow as long as companies still wish to advertise their production if it weren’t for commercial artist we would have the flashy Pepsi can logo’s also the nice big Joe Camel signs for smoking. Commercial artist have to find a way to sell the product just through designs that are appealing to the eye so that when a person looks at the ad the message that the commercial artist wanted to get across, does. I think many interesting things will happen with the field of commercial art because of the rapidly changing technology in the world today.


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