Icon of a Nation
As Illinois goes, so goes the nation...
Item #99 – Poster, 32nd Republican National Convention, July 14-17, 1980, Joe Lewis Arena, Detroit, Michigan. Robert Stevens Studios.
A bull elephant advances at dawn beneath the discorporate face of Abraham Lincoln; the face rests between shafts of a rising sun reflected from the pinnacle of a gleaming new citadel skyscraper mounting from the beast’s head. The elephant represents the GOP; the building, the touted rebirth of host city Detroit (and America); the illumining shafts, the dawn of a new day. Other Convention giveaways feature an elephant caricature – Lincoln subliminally iconized via the stovepipe hat the pachyderm sports. Nods to Lincoln as enduring party shepherd have been employed time and again at the local, state, and national campaign levels.