James Harvey (1929 – July 15, 1965) was an American

commercial Commercial may refer to: * a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television) ** Radio advertisement ** Television advertisement * (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...

and

fine artist In European academic traditions, fine art is developed primarily for aesthetics or creative expression, distinguishing it from decorative art or applied art, which also has to serve some practical function, such as pottery or most metalwork. ...

who was best known as the designer of the Brillo Pad box made famous by pop artist

Andy Warhol Andy Warhol (; born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the Art movement, visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore th ...

in 1964 at his " Stable Gallery Show". During his successful career as a commercial artist, Harvey did work for major clients such as

Pepsodent Pepsodent is an American brand of toothpaste with the minty flavor derived from sassafras. The brand was purchased by Unilever in 1942 and is still owned by the company outside of the United States and Canada. In 2003, Unilever sold the rights t ...

, Brillo, Philip Morris and others. Also known as an

abstract expressionist Abstract expressionism is a post–World War II art movement in American painting, developed in New York City in the 1940s. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve international influence and put New York at the center of the ...

painter, he died in 1965. James Harvey came from a

blue-collar A blue-collar worker is a working class person who performs manual labor. Blue-collar work may involve skilled or unskilled labor. The type of work may involving manufacturing, warehousing, mining, excavation, electricity generation and powe ...

, immigrant family. Harvey was born in 1929 in

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Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...

, Canada. His family moved to

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...

before he was a year old. Harvey studied painting at the Art Institute of Chicago. He later returned to Detroit, where he designed

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s for

retail Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholesaler, and ...

giant J. L. Hudson. Finally he moved to New York to break into the

art world The art world comprises everyone involved in producing, commissioning, presenting, preserving, promoting, chronicling, criticizing, buying and selling fine art. It is recognized that there are many art worlds, defined either by location or alte ...

. Harvey secured a position in the studio of

Egmont Arens Egmont Hegel Arens (December 15, 1887 – October 2, 1966) was an American publisher of literature and art, and an industrial designer and commercial artist specializing in marketing and product packaging. Career Washington Square Book Shop Egmo ...

, an industrial and packaging designer who helped usher in the “

streamlined Streamlines, streaklines and pathlines are field lines in a fluid flow. They differ only when the flow changes with time, that is, when the flow is not steady. Considering a velocity vector field in three-dimensional space in the framework of ...

” style before

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. In 1963 he redesigned the cigarette packaging, including the familiar geometric designs for

Marlboro Marlboro (, ) is an American brand of cigarettes, currently owned and manufactured by Philip Morris USA (a branch of Altria) within the United States and by Philip Morris International (now separate from Altria) outside the US. The largest Mar ...

giant Philip Morris. Harvey and his colleagues worked for two years on sketches, and did 200 final designs. The winner, selected by the executives of Phillip Morris was the most mediocre of the bunch, according to Harvey, who felt “It’s a committee-arrived-at thing,” In 1959, Egmont Arens fired his creative team. Two of them, Whitney Stuart and William Gunn, took Harvey with them as a freelance designer when they started their own company, called Stuart and Gunn, where Harvey completed the work for Brillo. In 1964,

launched the Stable Gallery exhibition (known as “ the soap-box show”). This was widely regarded as putting Warhol on the map, and critics panned the work. When Harvey saw his design in the gallery, he laughed it off, according to a ''

Print magazine ''Print'' is an American design and culture website that began as ''Print, A Quarterly Journal of the Graphic Arts'', in 1940, and continued publishing a physical edition through the end of 2017 as ''Print''. As a printed publication, ''Print'' ...

'' article "Shadow Boxer." The Graham Gallery, which represented Harvey's abstract expressionist art issued a press release on behalf of Stuart and Gunn (and Harvey) that stated: “It is galling enough for Jim Harvey, an abstract expressionist, to see that a pop artist is running away with the ball, but when the ball happens to be a box designed by Jim Harvey, and Andy Warhol gets the credit for it, well, this makes Jim scream: ‘Andy is running away with my box.’” But the final line practically admitted defeat: “What’s one man’s box, may be another man’s art.” James Harvey's last show, at Graham in November 1964, presented paintings that were “dynamic, restless, and painted with rich skill,” according to the

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

. But by July 15, 1965, Harvey was dead in New York's

Lenox Hill Hospital Lenox Hill Hospital (LHH) is a nationally ranked 450-bed non-profit, tertiary, research and academic medical center located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, servicing the tri-state area. LHH is one of the region's many unive ...

. He was reported to have died from

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

of the

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Harvey, James 1929 births 1965 deaths Artists from Detroit