'The Ladies Home Journal - Does One's Ass Look Big In This?" wall art print is a homage to a lost world of women's magazines.
This one features the cover from the June 1908 copy of 'The Ladies' Home Journal', which, at the time, was one of the best-selling magazines in the world.
Only five years before this particular edition was published, it was, in fact, the first American magazine to reach a million subscribers.
It is therefore with a glad heart and a tear in my eye that I am able to present to you, the worthy reader, the previously thought 'lost', but now found, cover from the 'Summer Ass' edition of 1908.
At the top we can see that this edition is the "The Summer Fashion Number With 100 Fashion Pictures", so basically the Instagram of its day.
You can see featured five lovely ladies taking a summer stroll with a 'Gentlemen Friend', holding a little red book no less - could he be a time traveller and an early follower of Chairman Mao and his 'Little Red Book'? NO! NO! Heaven forbid. Perhaps it is his luncheon diary? We may never know.
What is for certain is that ladies are accompanied on their stroll around the park by an 'Ass' (a donkey). A strange companion to be sure. But if you were forced to carry a parasol and wear sixteen types of undergarments, a corset, braiding, and who knows what else, just to have a quick walk, then you too may feel you would want to make the most of the outing by bringing a donkey along for company.
In fairness, they have done him proud with the gaudy decorations he wears. Though, appropriately (I am sure you will agree), his rather concerned owner (who no doubt used to own a chihuahua - or similar miniature breed) can be seen asking her friend:
"Does one's Ass look big in this?"
Such concern for animals.
Such heartfelt convivialities.
Such warmth.
Such rapturous denigrations of spirit would befit no other then Mr William Collins from the Jane Austen novel, Pride and Prejudice.
I am quite overcome dear reader.
I digress.
The ebb and flow of a bygone era...
By the way... The lovely original cover art (sans donkey and slogan) we have to thank a certain W.T Smedley for (more on him here).
And remember...
Big Asses.
Small Asses.
They are all of them, just the size they are supposed to be.
