ABSTRACT
The ascent of pictorially based communication constitutes one of the most intriguing historical phenomena of the twentieth century. The still picture in newspapers and magazines, as well as the moving picture of the cinema, rose triumphantly from the shadow of the letter that had governed Western civilization for the past several centuries. By midcentury, with the maturation of broadcast technology, pictures were spreading cultural and social communication in a steady, unbroken stream, day in and day out.
