That Pre-Christmas Spirit In Art And Illustration

Snow, warm yellow light coming out of cosy buildings, villages coming together, decorated trees, love, bell towers, churches, white people… The illustrations below are largely from 20th century illustration and convey the Christian American hygge of December.

Georg von Rosen (Swedish painter, 1843-1923) Julmarknaden, 1872
Jack Welch Christmas Main Street
Main Street At Christmas by Peter Helck for the Dec 1944 edition of Country Gentleman
A Christmas Card By Jenny Nystrom
Ladies Home Journal Magazine cover art from December 1928
Cover of the December 1931 issue of The American Girl magazine. For all girls, published by the Girl Scouts
Needlecraft The Home Arts Magazine, December 1934
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Dec 1940
Pauli Ebner (1873 – 1949, Austrian) Christmas Street
Woman's Home Companion December 1924
Woman’s Home Companion December 1924
Our Jolly Holidays Put-together Book story by M. Helena Crofts pictures by Helen E. Ohrenschall 1928
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Dec 1947 cover art by Francis Chase ‘Christmas 1947’
Josef Lada, Czech illustrator
On my way to Midnight Mass by Paul Caron (La Belle Province) 1900
Clarence Gagnon (Canadian 1881-1942) Midnight Mass 1933
Stepan Kolesnikov (1879-1955) Christmas
It always is Christmas Eve, in a ghost story – Jerome K. Jerome, 1891
Edna Eicke cover illustration, 1957
Henry Hintermeister Christmas Stockings
Ilonka Karasz 1953 New Yorker cover
Woman’s World Magazine December 1915 filling the Christmas stocking
Country Gentleman 12-1945, Merry Christmas F Hook. A young girl clutches The Night Before Christmas
1937 DEC COUNTRY GENTLEMAN MAGAZINE cover art
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Dec 1952
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Dec 1952
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Dec 1938 ERLE STANLEY GARDNER
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Dec 1938 ERLE STANLEY GARDNER
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Dec 1945 cover art by Henry Soulen ‘Christmas Carollers
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Magazine DECEMBER 1928
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN Magazine DECEMBER 1928
The Night Before Christmas by Denslow, 1903
BLUE BOOK (Pulp Magazine) Christmas December 1949
BLUE BOOK (Pulp Magazine) Christmas December 1949
Lizzie Lawson ‘The Christmas Fairy’ 1885
Arthur Getz for a 1963 issue of The New Yorker
Arthur Getz for a 1965 issue of The New Yorker
December 1959 Argosy Magazine cover
Ralph Barton (1891-1931) 1930
Butterfly Land a picture book by Sibylle v. Olfers, text adapted from German by Helen Dean Fish 1931
Betsy McCall visits Grandmother for Christmas. Published in the December 1960 issue of McCall’s magazine
Norman Rockwell (1894-1978) Christmas tree decorating on a ladder
Angus Clifford Racey Helps (1913–1970) cheese for Santa
Twas the Night Before Christmas Sarah Noble Ives, Sugar Plum Fairy
CONTEMPORARY FICTION SET IN AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND (2023)

On paper, things look fine. Sam Dennon recently inherited significant wealth from his uncle. As a respected architect, Sam spends his days thinking about the family needs and rich lives of his clients. But privately? Even his enduring love of amateur astronomy is on the wane. Sam has built a sustainable-architecture display home for himself but hasn’t yet moved into it, preferring to sleep in his cocoon of a campervan. Although they never announced it publicly, Sam’s wife and business partner ended their marriage years ago due to lack of intimacy, leaving Sam with the sense he is irreparably broken.

Now his beloved uncle has died. An intensifying fear manifests as health anxiety, with night terrors from a half-remembered early childhood event. To assuage the loneliness, Sam embarks on a Personal Happiness Project:

1. Get a pet dog

2. Find a friend. Just one. Not too intense.

PAPERBACK

KINDLE EBOOK

MORE INFO

error: Content is protected