The Feast of Saint Nicholas painting executed in the 17th century by Jan Steen for the first time depicts a family celebrating the Feast of Saint Nicholas. In 1860 he went to England for the New York Illustrated News and in the same year went to Italy to cover Giuseppe Garibaldis revolt for The Illustrated London News and American publications. The Atlanta-based company asked Haddon Sundblom, an illustrator of Swedish descent, to depict a paunchy, smiling Santa Claus, dressed in red, with ruddy cheeks and an elfish look. Nast said he based his Santa on a German version of Saint Nicholas, Pelze-Nicol. The legend of Santa Claus can be traced back hundreds of years to a monk named St. Nicholas. } According to Mccullough Hall, Thomas Nast told his family that he wanted most to be remembered for this image. As for France, it adopted the Santa Claus theme by giving him nice big cheeks, a red costume and a sack filled with toys, and officially renaming him le Pre Nol. These immigrants, founders of Nieuw Amsterdam (the future New York), introduced Sinterklaas in their new homeland. Nasts Santa Claus lives on into the present day. The Dutch are credited with transporting the legend of Saint Nicholas (Sinterklaas) to New Amsterdam (now New York City), along with the custom of giving gifts and sweets to children on his feast day, December 6. With limited education and little artistic training he joined the art staff of Frank Leslie's Illustrated as a teenager. Doing his first sketches as a teenager, he became a staff illustrator for Harpers Weekly, one of the most popular magazines of the day, in 1862. cartoonist Thomas Nast One of the most famous of Nasts Santa Claus illustrations is a drawing titled Merry Old Santa Claus that appeared in Harpers Weekly in 1881. Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street, Why did Thomas Nast draw Santa Claus? ], "The story of Santa Claus began with St. Nicholas, or Sinter Klaus," Pam Robson explains in her book, "How I Celebrate." Thomas Nast, (born September 27, 1840, Landau, Bavarian Palatinate [now Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany]died December 7, 1902, Guayaquil, Ecuador), American cartoonist, best known for his attack on the political machine of William M. Tweed in New York City in the 1870s. hbspt.forms.create({portalId: "6817144",formId: "a36f91dc-2cbf-4f96-9d1a-bf390cb71586"}); Artists Network is with you every step of your art journey. The original works were painted in oil, and then adapted for posters, billboards, and magazines. While the roots of the Santa story go back hundreds of years it is undeniable that the soft drink companys advertising campaigns around the Christmas holidays embedded their image of Santa firmly in the nations imagination. In the past Santa Claus was presented in various ways but Nast conceived and introduced our modern image of Santa Claus. In 1875, Louis Prang, the father of the American Christmas card, printed a series of postcards with a Santa Claus in a red costume. His January 3, 1863 cover depicted Santa Claus handing out presents to Union soldiers. A German immigrant to the United States, Thomas Nast (1840-1902) is best known for his illustrations and cartoons that were published in Harper's Weekly's Journal of Civilization.Nast is most associated with his depictions of "Boss Tweed" and "Santa Claus" and for his development and popularization of the donkey and elephant as political party symbols. Thomas Nast's cartoon shows a donkey in a lion's skin scaring an elephant and other animals. For the next 30 years Nast continued to draw Santa changing the color of his coat from tan to the red hes known for today. document.documentElement.className += 'js'; This Santa is a rather generic bearded old man, seen from the side in a star-spangled jacket. In the days before quick and easy photography, periodicals of all stripes employed artists to sketch current events. For this reason, Santa is still sometimes referred to as Saint Nick. The episode led him to be regarded as the patron saint of schoolchildren. "His emblematic cartoons have never failed to arouse enthusiasm and patriotism, and have always seemed to come just when these . He was a poor student, but evenfrom an early age, Nast showed an interest in drawing. Several American artists played a role in turning the image of a slim saint in bishop's robes into a chubby, jolly old man in tall boots. In 1866, he published a compilation of his drawings in Santa Klaus and His Works. Unsurprisingly, the drawings from the Civil War often fell solidly in the realm of propaganda; Nast staunchly supported abolition, civil rights and the Republicans. Nasts work gave Santa Claus a life and personality, rather than just using him as a symbol. From his pen came the Republican Partys elephant, Tammany Halls tiger, and one of the most popular images of Santa Claus. The former Bishop Nicholas, deprived of his miter and cross, was completely unrecognizable as a jolly grandfather with a long white beard. The book helped popularize the character of Santa Claus and give him an unprecedented profile. Even as Saint Nicholas was chased away from the Lutheran Protestant regions, he was welcomed in the Netherlands, despite its Calvinist majority. His cult began in Northern Europe at the time of the Crusades, particularly in Lorraine, of which he became the patron saint in the Middle Ages. The appearance of today's Santa Claus was set. Omissions? Coca-Cola History In fact, when Civil War cartoonist Thomas Nast drew Santa Claus for Harpers Weekly in 1862, Santa was a small elflike figure who supported the Union. It was the 1930s, in the middle of the depression, and not a happy time for many people. The poem was A Visit from Saint Nicholas which began, "Twas the night before Christmas.". This is a cool infographic on the Civil War from the Civil War Trust, Your email address will not be published. According to Gen. Ulysses S. Grant (via the Smithsonian), Nast "did as much as any one man to preserve the Union and bring the war to an end." Santa Claus was just part of that. The first mention of a well-fed old man riding on a sleigh pulled by reindeer. He portrays Santa Claus as being chubby, funny, with a long white beard, together a reindeer pulled sleigh on a roof. IsThisProtecting Life, Liberty, or Property? (Enter your ZIP code for information on American Experience events and screening in your area.). But even after the war ended, Nast continued to use Santa Claus to make certain pointed political statements. by Jasmine Liu December 23, 2021. !function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s) January 24, 1863 Article published in the December 2015 issue of France-Amrique. fbq('init', '271837786641409'); Probably not, but he is the one remembered in history. What Are Jan Van Eycks Most Famous Paintings? On a Christmas cover of, The origin of the red color of Santa Claus outfit is a mystery. Thomas Nast: Learn About the Man Behind Santa Claus, Christmas Eve Santa Claus Waiting for the Children to Get to Sleep by Thomas Nast, Emancipation of the Negroes The Past and the Future by Thomas Nast, Can the Law Reach Him? In President Lincoln's words, Santa Claus became "his best recruiting agent!" These sketches first attracted nationwide attention to his work. He contributed 33 Christmas drawings to Harper's Weekly from 1863 through 1886, and Santa is seen or referenced in all but one. Thomas Nast built upon this 19th-century persona when he began drawing Santa for Harpers Weekly. How did Ida Tarbell help end the Standard Oil monopoly? NTS is an online radio station based in London with studios in Los Angeles, Shanghai and Manchester. She wrote a series of articles exposing the corruption of Standard Oil. The political cartoonist Thomas Nast, who was a Lincoln-loving, abolition-advocating, Union-supporting Republican from New York published his first Santa on Jan. 3, 1861 in Harper's Weekly.. And as Reconstruction-era corruption and violence spun out of control, he drew cartoons that criticized black legislators as strongly as earlier cartoons had championed black suffrage and lamented white supremacist violence. Early Christmases often werent all that religious, to the point that Puritans briefly banned Christmas celebrations during the English civil wars of the mid-1600s. The saint appears in the dreams of a sleeping sailors and expresses the wish to see the Dutch immigrants settle and build a city on the island of Manna-hata (Manhattan). Happy Birthday General Robert E. Lee Confederate General Robert Edward Lee was born on this day in 1807. Our modern image of Santa Claus is directly indebted to Nasts dozens of Christmas illustrations for Harpers Weekly magazine in the 1860s-80s. March 23, 1867 How did Ida Tarbell expose the Standard Oil monopoly quizlet? Who was the first person to draw Santa Claus? He is credited with one particular miracle: liberating the city of Nancy, capital of the Duchy of Lorraine, from its Burgundian assailants. In 1860 Nast traveled to Italy as a war correspondent for The Illustrated London News and New York Illustrated News. This image pairs holiday sentiment with political messaging. Much earlier, the American cartoonist Thomas Nast fashioned Santa Clauss image on the pages of the American magazine, The character of Santa Claus is believed to descend from Bishop Nicholas of Myra, who lived in the 4, The cult of Saint Nicholas did not escape Europes religious upheavals. He presented an as yet unseen Santa Claus, a cheery fellow with ruddy cheeks: He had a broad face and a little round belly; That shook when he laughed, like a bowlful of jelly! Nast routinely criticized him for this corruption, depicting him here as only having money for brains. Children came to believe that he would reward them if they were good.". Thomas Nast is the creator of the still-popular images of the Democratic Party represented by a donkey and the Republican Party represented by an elephant. Thomas H. Nast, Photograped by Sarony, Union Square, N.Y. In the 1920s, the company began to run magazine ads aimed at reminding people that Coca-Cola wasn't just a summer drink . Most often asked questions related to bitcoin. Du Bois in Paris. Nast's Santa generally stayed in line with Moore's depiction of a plump old man with a white beard, but often changed the wardrobe options ranging from suit patterns to hats and shoes. Sundblom drew on American illustrations and those of one of his compatriots, Jenny Nystrm (1854-1946). Above all, Coca-Colas red and white colors determined those of Santa Claus contemporary uniform. 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Many of Nasts most effective cartoons, such as his Tammany Tiger Loose and Group of Vultures Waiting for the Storm to Blow Over (both 1871), were virulent attacks on New Yorks Tammany Hall political machine led by Boss Tweed. Nast arrived back in New York in1861 and in September he married Sarah Edwards. He was a critic of Democratic Representative Boss Tweed and the Tammany Hall Democratic party political machine. Why did Nast draw Santa? Instead, it would be illustrations by an immigrant living in New York City in the coming years that would take the St. Nicholas portrayed in the poem and turn him into modern-day Santa Claus. Thomas Nast: self-caricature Nast arrived in New York as a boy of six. Although they sometimes contained coded political elements, they most often focused on childhood, sentimentality, and the importance of family. Your email address will not be published. Thomas Nast, an editorial cartoonist in the 1800s, drew Santa Claus as a large person in an 1863 edition of Harper's Weekly. In parallel, Louis Prang (1824-1907), the man who introduced Christmas cards to the United States in 1875, also took part in developing the clich by depicting Santa in a snowy and icy setting, wearing a big coat with a hood lined with white fur, boots and a cloth bag for toys. Its widely believed that todays Santa wears a red suit because thats the colour associated with CocaCola, but this isnt the case. Abraham Lincoln called him our best recruiting sergeant. During Reconstruction, Nasts cartoons portrayed Pres. A few years later, in December 1823, Clement Clark Moore, a professor at New Yorks Episcopalian seminary, published a poem intended for his own children called Twas the Night Before Christmas in The Sentinel, a New York state newspaper. Nast gives higher purpose to the horror of war in his multi-part depiction of the past lives of African Americans and the future Emancipation could bring them. "Without Thomas Nast, our vision of Santa Claus might be very different. Santa Claus and his reindeer fly across the top of the image and climb down the familys chimney on the left. He was dressed in a red suit with white fur and a black belt. Actually, the original Santa was rather slim, but cartoonists and commercial ads artists gave him a makeover. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. The current depiction of Santa Claus is based on images drawn by cartoonist Thomas Nast for Harper's Weekly beginning in 1863. His clearest early ancestor was St. Nicholas, a 4th-century CE bishop from Myra, in modern-day Turkey. Even as Saint Nicholas was chased away from the Lutheran Protestant regions, he was welcomed in the Netherlands, despite its Calvinist majority. Thomas Nast was most actively involved in political commentary during his long career. N.P., as you may have guessed, stands for the North Pole. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. His illustrations supported the cause he believed was just, and the candidate he thought was best. Saint Nicholas, or Sinterklaas by his Dutch name, is their ships figurehead, protecting them from the storm. He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf., In this poem inspired by the folk legends of the German, Dutch and Norwegian communities settled in the United States, one no longer recognizes the austere Bishop of Myra!
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