Olympische Spiele Munchen “The Artistic Series”

Olympics Posters have been prized since the first International Olympics in 1896.

Original David Hockney Olympics Poster Printed 1972

Because the Olympics is such an important event and an event which is planned many years ahead of time, Olympics committees develop a concept, sometimes a logo or official image and mascot and then these things become part of the graphic identity of a particular Olympics. The posters are commissioned years in advance, and the artists chosen with care, often by contest.

It is a truism that artists produce better work when they are expressing themselves, then when they are trying to express the vision of their clients by commission.  (For more on this, see “Drive” by Daniel Patterson)*  This is apparent when viewing the famous “Artistic Series” of Olympic Posters from the 1972 Olympics in Munich.

Original Josef Albers Olympics Poster Printed 1972

The 1960’s encouraged experiment, and so, for the first time, a group of artists was selected by the Olympics Committee to create osters and given free reign to create what they pleased.  Twenty-eight artists from Japan, Britain, Scotland, Germany, The US, Russia, Austria, Switzerland, Poland,  France, Spain, and Italy designed these posters, and they were printed and sold through the Kennedy galleries of New York.

Some of the artists were already quite prominent when commissioned, such as Jacob Lawrence, Joseph Albers and David Hockney.  Others were lesser known, A few were rising stars such as Chilled, Hartung, Kokoshka. Regardless of the fame of the artist, these posters are a great graphic representation of the style of contemporary art of the time period.

Original Otmar Alt Olympics Poster Printed 1972

Many of our clients collect these posters, because they are beautiful, affordable, and they work well in groupings. In fact, they read like pop art when framed with chunky brushed aluminum frames or white frames.

Our blog, for the next few weeks, will feature some of these posters.  They fit very well with our March Exhibition “March Masters”  which open March 17th in our showroom in Berkeley.  This show features the poster art of fine artists.  You can view the entire Olympics series on our website in the sports section. Enjoy!

*Pink, Daniel H. Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. New York: Riverhead, 2011. Print.

Spring Skiing, a Cataloguing Project

Original poster for famous Swiss ski destination Davos, by Willy Trapp

My name is Karlie, and I am a fourth year student at UC Berkeley, studying History and Art History. I have been an intern at Vintage European Posters for almost a year, and I have loved the experience thus far.

Original ski poster by Ludwig Hohlwein

We recently had the opportunity of evaluating a collection of over 200 original ski posters for a client who has been collecting posters since childhood. Since we have almost finished the project, we wanted to share some of these great images with you.

Ski posters can be some of the rarest, and in some cases the most beautiful and intricately designed posters. The collection we worked with included landscapes, scenes of skiing and rolling ski slopes, and speed skaters racing against each other. It was a geographically diverse group of posters, with pieces from countries such as Italy, Switzerland, Germany, France, Russia, and even Yugoslavia and the United States. There were examples of graphic design from every time period of the last century.

Cataloging this immense collection of ski posters was no easy task. There were

Original ski poster by Herbert Leupin

over 225 pieces, and each needed to be photographed, measured and then identified by the title, country of printing, printer, year of printing, and condition. Although some of the posters had the year apparent in the printer’s info or artists signature or contained the year in the title as part of a ski competition, finding the correct time period was a challenge.

We had to research the individual posters in our poster catalogues and the ski poster books that we had, and some had to be identified by the printing style. In different countries, offset printing was developed at different times, and thus through this detective work we could estimate the dates of each poster, whether the poster harkened from Germany, France, Russia, Switzerland, or Italy. Sometimes identifying the artist was challenging as well, since sometimes a scrawled signature or set of initials was all the information we had. However, we did uncover many famous artists such as Leupin,  Villemot, Willy Trapp, Ludwig Hohlwein, and Emil Cardinaux in the collection.

Original ski poster by Walter Herdeg

For further reading, consider the book: A Century of Swiss Winter Sports Posters by Jean-Charles Giroud (Geneva: Patrick Cramer Publisher, 2006)

Luxury Problems

Winter always finds me dreaming of travel.  This year, we are definitely going back to Europe.  We are overdue to visit with friends, and there are posters, there are always posters to be tracked down.

I think the trip will go like this:

Original San Francisco Via TWA poster

We always have to fly out of San Francisco.  Sigh,  When will Oakland become a real international airport?  Oh well.  Love the architecture of the I.M. Pei designed SFO International terminal.

Germany Fly TWA Jets by David Klein

This time, we will fly into Germany, and rather than simply going thru customs there, will actually leave the airport and visit with friends. We are hoping to see some great architecture, some castles, visit salt mines, and go on ski runs in the sun.

I have to figure out the train schedule to see what our next move will be. But we will definitely spend time in Paris with our family who lives  there.

Original Paris Air France Poster with L'Arc de Triomphe and Champs Elysee

While my children have been to France a number of times, I am determined that they know the names of all of the monuments, so we are going to do a tourist trip, an attempt to touch everything from L’Arc de Triomphe Carrosel to Arc De Triomphe L’Etoile.  Of course we will be stopping for Jardin de Luxembourg, Tuileries, L’Orangerie, the Bateaux Mouche, The Promenade Plantee, Opera, Rue de Rivoli, Bois de Boulogne, Place des Vosges, the Marais, and more.

Original Air France Poster "Paris Gateway to Europe"

I can only take so much of any city in the hot summer, so after 4 or 5 days in Paris, we will head to the country.

Original travel poster, circa 1920 "Aix en Provence" by Feguide

Where, it will, without fail, also be hot.  We have enjoyed exploring Provence in the past,  where the wind or “Le Mistral” picks up in the afternoon, howling like a banshee and making the shutters crash if not battened down.  On our last trip we visited Ardeches, saw the incredible rock formation, and swam in the cold river.  Provence offers a rich experience of the past.  The villages are heartbreakingly beautiful, with houses of stone, winding cobbled streets, wooden shutters, window boxes and planters stuffed with roses and pelargoniums.

Original poster from the S.N.C.F. "Provence" by Yves Brayer

The landscape of Provence is made up of chalky, craggy hillsides, dotted with olive trees and surrounded by fields of lavender and sunflowers.  There are ruins on many hills, old fortresses built into the hills, with vantage points in every direction, overgrown stone stairs, and crumbling turrets. You also find restored castles, full of art and tapestry, furniture, weapons and gift shops.  For these you will pay admission.

Now that we know where we are headed, one big choice remains.  Should we fly Air France or United Airlines?

Original "United Airlines San Francisco" poster by Stan Galli

Original "Paris Air France" poster by Vernier

Our Latest Import from France

Vintage European Posters loves France and its products: VEP loves posters of course, French foods … and now French interns.

Vintage European Posters has just acquired a new import from France: my name is Candie — a sweet directly coming from the best French food region, le Périgord. Le Périgord is known for its precious truffles, delicious duck confit and foie gras. It is in the region of Bordeaux in the South West of France.

Candie -- can you tell I'm French?

I will be traveling with Vintage European Posters for the summer. I will be writing this blog for a little while, bringing you the freshest news about our shows, our collection and the business. I will also be  telling you some stories about the French and their relationship to posters and the products they advertise.

As a start, let me tell you about our lovely Maggi poster.

Original "Maggi Arome Pour Corser" Poster by Firmin Bouisset, c. 1895

You have probably already noticed the sweet expression on the little’s girl’s face, the rich red color of her dress, the Art Nouveau background. What you might not know is that Firmin Bouisset chose  his own children as models! The little girl holding the Maggi sign is the artist’s daughter.  She is the model for the very famous Chocolat Menier Poster.

Original "Chocolat Menier" Poster by Firmin Bouisset, 1892

Chocolat Menier is one of the most famous posters of the Belle Epoque Era, and has been lovingly reproduced all over the United States on coffee mugs and tea trays, greeting cards and lunchboxes.  I bet Bouisset’s daughter had no idea she would be so well loved more than 100 years after she was lovingly captured in a poster by her father.

Here is Firmin Bouisset’s son captured in the LU biscuits poster and also beloved by many Americans — and French — today.

Original "LU" Poster by Firmin Bouisset, 1897

Now let me tell you the story behind those brands, or rather their importance in the memory and everyday life of many French people.

One of Maggi’s most famous product is the bouillon cube, a little flavored cube that you can add to your stocks in order to give them a nice and rich meaty flavor. This product has long been used by French cooks to replace the traditional meat stock — too long to make and expensive, especially in times of shortage after the two world wars.

Even now in 2011, my mom still uses it when she doesn’t really have time to make soup. A French woman from the countryside, she makes a point of eating soup every day. The first time I asked her what she put in her soup, and she confessed she had used a “cube Maggi,” she winked at me and told me she had cheated (“tricher”) but that if we didn’t tell, our guests wouldn’t see the difference. It was her little trick she said, her little secret to make good food and quickly — even when she invited people to stay for dinner at the last minute.

As for Lu’s petit beurre, it has always been my Dad’s favorite biscuit –this is true for many French people as well. At every breakfast, he would dip a couple of biscuits in his coffee and eat them. Meanwhile, I would be eating my petit beurre’s’ teeth’ or ridges one by one, then dip the rest in my hot cocoa — or suck on my Dad’s coffee-flavored biscuits.

When I moved to the US, I bought some random brand’s bouillon cubes, and some American cookies, made some soup and some coffee, hoping to get the same rich Maggi taste of my mom’s soups, and the melting buttery flavor of my Dad’s petit beurres. But it just wasn’t the same.  Now where can I find some Lu and Maggi?

World War One Helmets and Vintage Military Posters

The Hillsborough Antiques show in April was amazing. There were a number of new dealers in the show who brought in fresh merchandise and that added excitement to an already stellar display.

One of the booths I was fascinated with was that of a military dealer from Rocklin, CA (Booth 527 at the show)  who featured a collection of helmets from both wars, as well as knives, medals and a little bit of ‘trench art’.

I couldn’t help but think about all of the original military posters we have in our collection which feature these very same helmets. Take a look.

The Germans wore a helmet with a spike called a ‘Picklehaube’  in the beginning of World War I.   WWI one was largely fought in trenches- wet, miserable trenches that provided needed shelter for soldiers between battles and also provided cover from artillery. “Daytime in the trenches alternated between short periods of intense fear, when the enemy fired, and longer periods of boredom.” (World War 1 by Simon Adams c. 2001)

Authentic Pickelhaube circa 1915

Price Tag and Descriptor for Pickelhaube

The Pickle in the Picklehaube turned out to be a target as the German soldiers moved about in their trenches, telling their foes exactly where to fire.  As a result, this helmet was discontinued in late 1915.

In this famous poster by Abel Faivre, the Kaiser is shown, head down, vanquished with a broken sword.  He is shadowed by the encroaching glorious flags of France, Britain, Italy, Belgium and the United States. The image of the Kaiser with the Pickelhaube is anachronistic because the United States joined the war in 1918, and in fact, saw our first major battle September 12-16 in St. Mihiel.

L'Emprunt de la Liberation Poster 1918 by Abel Faivre

American Soldier holding Three Pickelhaube souvenir helmets in "And They Thought We Couldn't Fight" Poster 1918

“And They Thought We Couldn’t Fight”  by Claude Forsythe is a famous image of victory which is packed with meaning.  France was in peril in early 1918, the war looked like it would be won by Germany and it’s Allies.   The US has steered clear of the War since it began in 1914 because we were ‘a country strongly divided’.  Our populace, made up of many European immigrants, disagreed about which side to back in the conflict.  As a result, The United States was criticized in Europe, even taunted.  This poster answers the taunt with a bloody and victorius American soldier carrying three german pickelhaubes as souvenirs.

US Marine Helmet from WWI at the Hillsborough Antiques Show

Here is the US Marines Helmet we saw at the show.  The soldier depicted in the “And They Thought we Couldn’t Fight” poster looks as if he may be a Marine.  The soldier in “Go Over The Top with US Marines” is unquestionably clad in one.  The Marine Insignia on the original helmet is hard to see in the photo above.

Original WWI Poster "Go Over the Top With U.S. Marines" by Coughlin printed 1917

Antique Shows offer an incredible window into history.  At the recent Hillsborough Antiques Show in San Mateo, these helmets and  these posters were both available for viewing and for purchase.  Attendees also had the opportunity to visit with dealers who specialize in military history.  Today, in 2011, we are approaching the centennial of World War One, which offers us an opportunity to examine these artefacts with 100 years of persepective.

"This Device on Hat or Helmet" poster by Charles Buckles Falls