Bacchanalia

Hendrik Glintenkamp

In 1929 America was in the midst of a war on excess, with particular gravitas lent to the Prohibition Movement, and there was likely more discussion about the subject in printed form than had ever been published before. In May of that year a debate over whether America would be more successful as a “dry” nation than otherwise was published in The Forum magazine under the title “Can Prohibition Succeed? A Socratic Dialogue.” Included in the debate was a statistician, a mathematician, a novelist, a professor of political economy, a lawyer and libertarian, and the research director of the Association Against the Prohibition Amendment.

The format was a paragraph each to the debaters and then their respective replies; and to accompany the lively text was a series of woodcut images by Hendrik Glintenkamp, commissioned by the editor of The Forum to illustrate popular scenes of imbibery. Among them was “The Bacchanalia,” showing one of history’s most famous gatherings of jolly excess. Its roots are tangled in ancient political and religious intrigue, and is often brandished by both pro and con camps when creating government policy.

Glintenkamp was a keen graphic artist and this work envelopes a large and theatrical idea within a relatively small window. Romans in various stages of undress dance, lounge, embrace, toast, and - above all - drink. Glintenkamp’s style for this piece is the sharp, polished, clean-lined style revered in the Art Deco era, at its height just before the collapse of the American economy mere months after this image was executed.