The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 18, 2025

Rectangular piece of fabric densely patterned in dark blue and white with an orchestra of musicians playing their instruments. The musicians are white, flat, and stylized, made from circles and rectangles with their instruments shaped with simplified outlines. Fine, blue lines detail their facial features and hairlines. The composition is dominated by the shapes of the largest instruments, a white circle for drums, and blue fin shape for the piano.

Rhapsody (No. 700)

1927
designed by

John Held, Jr.

(American, 1889–1958)
manufacturer

Stehli Silks Corporation

(United States; Pennsylvania, Lancaster; and New York, New York, 1840–c. 1955)
America, New York
Silk crepe; plain weave, roller printed
Overall: 47.6 x 53.3 cm (18 3/4 x 21 in.)
Gift of the Stehli Silks Corporation 1928.583
Location: 234 Textile Gallery

Description

This silk fabric design, created by popular advertising illustrator and artist John Held in 1927, was part of Stehli Silk Corporation’s Americana Prints, series III. According to Stehli’s promotional material at the time, it was George Gershwin’s 1924 composition Rhapsody in Blue that inspired Held’s textile design, also called Rhapsody. The Americana Prints sought to capture American culture in the 1920s, telling stories about contemporary American life during the Jazz Age, a time in which American music and dance styles gained worldwide popularity. Rhapsody was produced in several difference colors, in addition to the blue version seen here.
  • Duncan, Alastair. American Art Deco. New York: Abrams, 1986. p. 144
    Mendes, Valerie D. Novelty Fabrics. New York: H.N. Abrams, 1988. plate 6
    McKnight, Lola S. The Americana Prints: A Collection of Artist-Designed Textiles. Thesis submitted to the Division of Graduate Studies, SUNY, Fashion Institute of Technology, New York. December 1993. p. 175
    Boardman, Michelle, and Allentown Art Museum. All That Jazz : Printed Fashion Silks of the ’20s and ’30s. Allentown, Pa.: Allentown Art Museum, 1998. cover, p. 26
  • American Printed Silks, 1927–1947. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 9, 2025-November 8, 2026).
    An Approach to Museum Objects. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 3-June 30, 1958).
  • {{cite web|title=Rhapsody (No. 700)|url=false|author=John Held, Jr., Stehli Silks Corporation|year=1927|access-date=18 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1928.583