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Object Timeline

1981

  • Work on this object began.

1995

  • We acquired this object.

2013

2016

2025

  • You found it!

Poster, The Adding Machine

This is a Poster. It was designed by Art Chantry and made for (as the client) Bathhouse Theatre. It is dated 1981 and we acquired it in 1995. Its medium is screenprint on white wove paper. It is a part of the Drawings, Prints, and Graphic Design department.

Although Art Chantry’s graphic style draws from a diverse range of sources, Dadaist and Constructivist approaches to collaged imagery have been deeply influential. His poster announcing the opening of a play, The Adding Machine, exemplifies the Dadaist qualities of incongruity and overlapping images, yet maintains an ordered layout with type that is still legible. The designer uses elements from the play to create visual puns; technology replaces a milquetoast accountant in the play, for example, and Chantry’s suited figure is given a keyboard for a mouth.

This object was donated by Art Chantry. It is credited Gift of Art Chantry.

  • Poster, Adler Typewriter
  • lithograph on paper.
  • Gift of the Eric Kellenberger Collection, Switzerland and museum purchase....
  • 2005-12-2

Its dimensions are

45.1 x 30.5 cm (17 3/4 in. x 12 in.)

It is signed

Imprinted in black ink, lower right: ART CHANTRY

Cite this object as

Poster, The Adding Machine; Designed by Art Chantry (American, b. 1954); Client: Bathhouse Theatre; USA; screenprint on white wove paper; 45.1 x 30.5 cm (17 3/4 in. x 12 in.); Gift of Art Chantry; 1995-69-31

There are restrictions for re-using this image. For more information, visit the Smithsonian’s Terms of Use page.

For higher resolution or commercial use contact ArtResource.

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/18651847/ |title=Poster, The Adding Machine |author=Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum |accessdate=6 February 2025 |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}</ref>