Opera glasses, from the Novelties series (N228, Type 3) issued by Kinney Bros.
Medium
Commercial color lithograph
Dimensions
Sheet: 1 7/16 × 2 5/8 in. (3.7 × 6.6 cm)
Classification
Prints|Ephemera
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
The Jefferson R. Burdick Collection, Gift of Jefferson R. Burdick
Accession Number
Burdick 218, N228.161
Tags
Art Historical Context
Step into the vibrant world of late 19th-century American advertising with *Opera Glasses* from Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company's Novelties series (N, Type 3), a diminutive 1889 commercial color lithograph just 1 7/16 × 2 5/8 inches. Produced as an insert for cigarette packs, this ephemera captures the era's obsession with collectible cards, enticing smokers with glamorous imagery likely featuring a stylish woman peering through opera glasses symbol of refined leisure and-society entertainment. Crafted via chromolithography, a revolutionary printing technique that enabled vivid, multi-layered...
About the Artist
Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company · 1869–2011
**Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company (1869–2011)** Founded around 1869 by Francis Sherwood Kinney in New York City, the Kinney Brothers Tobacco Company quickly rose to prominence in the burgeoning American cigarette industry. Francis, a pioneering tobacco manufacturer, experimented with hand-rolled cigarettes using blends of Turkish and Virginia tobacco, scaling to mass production by employing Europ...