Commercial art is more than just mass-produced publicity; it constructs social and political ideologies that impact the public’s everyday life. In The Fine Art of Persuasion, Gennifer Weisenfeld examines the evolution of Japanese advertising graphic design from the early 1900s through the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, a pivotal design event that rebranded Japan on the world stage. Through richly illustrated case studies, Weisenfeld tells the story of how modern corporations and consumer capitalism transformed Japan’s visual culture and artistic production across the pre- and postwar periods, revealing how commercial art helped constitute the ideological formations of nation- and empire-building. Weisenfeld also demonstrates, how under the militarist regime of imperial Japan, national politics were effectively commodified and marketed through the same mechanisms of mass culture that were used to promote consumer goods. Using a multilayered analysis of the rhetorical intentions of design projects and the context of their production, implementation, and consumption, Weisenfeld offers an interdisciplinary framework that illuminates the importance of Japanese advertising design within twentieth-century global visual culture.

"“The Fine Art of Persuasion is a landmark study. The wide-ranging evidence Gennifer Weisenfeld presents leaves no doubt about the impact of commercial design in the development of Japan’s consumer capitalism. Generously illustrated and crisply written, this book will be a go-to reference for anyone interested in the convergence of advertising and mass media within Japan’s rapidly evolving and often fraught social, political, and economic history.”" - Craft Culture in Early Modern Japan: Materials, Makers, and Mastery