Burton Rice was an American designer, illustrator, photographer, and poster artist in the early and mid 1900's. He was an American native born in a Chicago suburb in April 1894. Burton designed a wide range of products, but you might know him under a different name. When designing fashion pieces, he often used the pseudonym of Dynevor Rhys. No one knows why Rice did this. Some believe he wished to save his real name for fine art, but this was never confirmed. All we know is that this change happened after his New York studio burned down in November of 1923. After the fire, Rice began submitting magazine covers as Dynevor Rhys.
You can see his style most clearly through his poster design. His posters are always heavily illustrative. The posters usually feature a bold illustration of a prominent character in the center. In much of his work, you can see how he directs the viewer's eye to the character. In The Eye of God, he uses a spotlight on the character to force your eye to his primary illustration. On the Nazimova poster, Rice highlights his character with a shape behind her to make her pop off the background. On the poster for Shoes, he treats his language of visual hierarchy a little differently. Instead of directing the eye to the character through outside elements, he makes the character the only thing to look at apart from the type. He forces your eye to the illustration by giving nothing else to look at and distract the viewer.
In his work, he often uses bold colors on a neutral background. This treatment makes his colors pop off the poster. You also rarely see the use of white in his work. Often, his base color is more of a tan. White is sometimes used to highlight features such as the woman in Nazimova. There are also some consistencies in his treatment of type. His typography always uses serif typefaces. The look and weight changes, but they always feature serifs.
If you look through these posters, you can see his unique signature. You can also see the different ways he marks his work. While his full name appears on Shoes and The Eye of God, he only initials Nazimova. No matter which he uses, he always adds a diagonal line on the right side.
Through his years as a designer, Burton Rice produced many impressive pieces. His posters help capture an era. Through his work, we can better experience the time period. His designs help remind us of where design has been and inspire us in our design work today.
