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Object Timeline

  • We acquired this object.

1952

  • Work on this object began.

2020

2021

2025

  • You found it!

Book, Invisible Man

This is a Book. It was designed by E. McKnight Kauffer and published by Random House. It is dated 1952. Its medium is lithograph. It is a part of the department.


Invisible Man documents the fictional experience of a college-educated African American man struggling in a segregated society that constantly denies his humanity. Ellison spoke highly of Kauffer’s jacket design, which evoked the narrative’s emotions and tensions of feeling unseen. On the cover, a male face in three-quarter profile fades into the dark background, signaling the psychological strain of the narrator.

It is credited Exhibition purchase.

Its dimensions are

H x W: 21.5 × 14.5 cm (8 7/16 × 5 11/16 in.)

This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibition Underground Modernist: E. McKnight Kauffer.

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If you would like to cite this object in a Wikipedia article please use the following template:

<ref name=CH>{{cite web |url=https://www-4.collection.cooperhewitt.org/objects/2318805326/ |title=Book, Invisible Man |author=Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |accessdate=11 February 2025 |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}</ref>