Studebaker Car Advertisement c. 1940

This Studebaker Car Advertisement, made by Paul Hesse, presents an aspirational vision of mid-century America. The photograph is printed on smooth paper, with a surface that almost glows, thanks to some expert lighting. The colours are so muted. It's a world of pastels, aquamarine, white, and soft pinks, which makes the image feel both nostalgic and somehow synthetic. Look at the way the light falls on the car's surface. It’s so even, so perfectly distributed, that the car almost seems to hover in place. Nothing is quite solid in this world. The turquoise of the car is echoed in the sky, blending the boundary between the real and the ideal. What's interesting here is how the image feels very staged and polished, a kind of precursor to the hyperrealism we would see later in the work of artists like Richard Estes. But while Estes captures a certain urban grit, Hesse offers something much more dreamlike and sanitized. It speaks to the power of advertising to shape our perceptions and desires.