Those whose task it was to come up with ideas for trade, collector’s, confectionery or cigarette card made much use of this type of theme. From field to table, from forest to paper, from the ocean to the plate, from cocoa bean to chocolate bar, et al. They made a handy starting point for a 4 or 6 part narrative set in a world familiar to the consumer. These cards were issued by Liebig whose main pan-European business was the processing of animal carcasses into liquid form for bottled spreads or dried, compressed powder for shaping and packaging into stock cubes. Liebig’s range of cards for collectors encompassed an encyclopaedic range of subjects, accessible and obscure, such as Entomology, Botany, Zoology, the Classical Orders of Architecture, Lives of the Great Composers, the Triumphs of the Caesars, the Campaigns of Charlemagne and a Taxonomy of Earthworms. Adopting a high standard of illustration and production values was a key factor in retaining and expanding the customer base by appealing to the instincts of collectors. This set of cards shows an orderly universe where sober and industrious workers conduct themselves with the minimum of fuss in well-lit uncluttered workplaces.
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