It Happened Here: Posters from the San Francisco Bay Area

Stan Galli, San Francisco United Airlines Cable Car, c. 1955

The West has always beckoned to those in search of change.  The adventurous came to California to put a stake in land, to chase after gold, and later, in search of personal transformation in the summer of love.

How did the word get out about the promise of the West?  Posters provide an answer.

This summer Vintage European Posters will showcase a collection of posters from the San Francisco Bay Area in a show titled “It Happened Here.” The show features posters about the Vietnam War protests, women’s rights, black power, as well as selected works by Berkeley Poster artist David Lance Goines.

David Lance Goines, Applause Is Not Enough, 1994

Don’t miss out on this collection of local history!

The show runs from May 18 – July 3^rd

Come visit us for the show’s opening weekend
Saturday, May 18 from 10-6
Sunday, May 19 from  11-5

And see us every week on Tuesdays & Wednesdays from  11-5 and by appointment.

Call us at 510 843 2201 to schedule an appointment.

This post was written by  Elizabeth Norris, owner of Vintage European Posters, and edited by Emily Jackson, Media Director.

A Guide to Being an Informed Poster Buyer

At Vintage European Posters, we like to say that we don’t sell you posters, we find you the posters you love. We also know that it can be very overwhelming to walk into a poster shop where you are offered  hundreds of original posters to choose from, so here are some helpful tips to help you become an informed poster buyer.

1. Purchase posters that you love. Many factors determine the value of a vintage poster, including its rarity, condition, designer, and sometimes subject matter, but the most important feature of a poster is that it speaks to you.

2. Know your source. Members that display the IVPDA logo have passed a series of stringent membership requirements. Association members have many years of professional experiences and are respected within the arts community for their knowledge and integrity.

3. Original posters were advertising items, not meant to last, and were printed on inexpensive paper. Therefore, a poster printed on heavy stock or good quality paper may be suspect.

4. Know your wall space. Vintage Posters come in all shapes and sizes, so it is always a good idea to know your size requirements and restrictions ahead of time. Your IVPDA member-dealer will help you identity and obtain posters that suit the space you have to display them. *

5. Have fun! This is a time for you to engage with the posters that intrigue you and learn about their history. At Vintage European Posters we do our best to foster an engaging and welcoming environment to help you feel comfortable in choosing the right poster for your space and lifestyle.

Jules Alexandre-Grun, Cocorico! 1913

Linen Backing and Mounting

Using a reversible conservation method, most posters today are professionally linen backed; mounted on acid free paper and a light cotton canvas or mounted on acid free Japanese rice paper. The IVPDA membership includes professionals who undertake this work as well as restoration, if necessary

The IVPDA

The International Vintage Poster Dealers Association (IVPDA) is a non-profit professional organization of dealers, which provides strict guidelines to ensure the authenticity of the posters for sale. Dealers displaying the IVPDA logo are found in many cities around the world. Members are committed to the highest standards of professional ethics in the collectibles industry and have been carefully screened for their knowledge of printing techniques, posters, and business ethics.

Villemot, Perrier C’est Fou, 1976

*Numbers 1-4 reprinted form the IVPDA brochure. (Now out of print) 

This post was written by Emily Jackson, UC Berkeley Art History Student and Gallery Assistant, and edited by Elizabeth Norris, Owner Vintage European Posters   www.vepca.com

Vintage European Posters was established in 1997. We are the West Coast’s Largest Dealer in Original Vintage Posters from France and the United States. See us online anytime at www.vepca.com and at our Berkeley Showroom OUTPOST 2201 Fourth Street, Tuesdays and Thursdays

The Value of an Iconic Image: James Montgomery Flagg and the Famous “I Want You” Poster

Flagg, I Want You, 1917

Those new to collecting posters sometimes ask, “Why buy the original?” To answer that question, let’s take a look at a poster we all recognize, “I Want You” by James Montgomery Flagg, the iconic military recruiting poster from World War I.  The market performance of this poster over the past quarter century is impressive, and like all other posters, it tells a story.  There is a tremendous amount of information to be found about the artist who created this piece, and about the time and tradition from whence this poster came.

There were a recorded 4,000,000 copies of “I Want You” printed in 1917, so this poster could hardly be considered rare.  Yet, like all other advertising posters, the value of the piece today depends on how many are in circulation (remember most posters were used and destroyed) as well as the demand for the poster in question.  When an original “I Want You” poster sold at auction in 1985, it fetched $1,540* , which was high for a World War I poster at the time.  Twenty-one years later in 2006, it fetched $6,900. * Today, this piece can be found on the market for $8,500. This type of appreciation is not unusual for original advertising posters, particularly those by well-known artists.

James Montgomery Flagg was born in 1877 and sold his first illustration to the magazine St. Nicholas at age 12.  He began to illustrate regularly for Life magazine at the age of 14, and went on to work for such popular magazines as Judge, Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, Liberty and Harper’s Weekly, producing on average of 1 illustration a day. Flagg was proud of his ability to work quickly.  He was a versatile artist, using oil paints, pencil, pen and ink, watercolor and even sculpture.

It is interesting to note that Flagg briefly lived in Paris in 1900, during in the heyday of poster art, when the city streets were made bright with the works of prominent posterists Jules Cheret, Alphonse Mucha, Henri de Toulouse Lautrec and Theophile Steinlen.  One can surmise that Flagg couldn’t help but absorb the fundamentals of good poster design from his exposure to the French masters of illustration.

When World War I broke out and the Division of Pictorial Publicity was formed to create a nationwide poster campaign, Flagg was an inaugural member.  “I Want You” was drawn first as a cover of the magazine “Leslie’s Weekly” and quickly turned into the most successful recruiting poster of all time.

Leete, Your Country Needs You, 1914

The image owes a debt to the 1914 British recruiting poster “Your Country Needs You” designed by Alfred Leete, which features Britain’s Secretary of State Lord Kitchener pointing at the viewer with an imposing stare. While effective in communicating the message to enlist, the poster is monochromatic and stark.  By contrast, the Uncle Sam Image in James Montgomery Flagg’s  “I Want You” is vibrant with color, and the muscle and sinew of the character represent strength and grit.  It is no wonder the artist reprised the character in a number of other WWI posters.

Photographs of Flagg dressed as Uncle Sam during WWII

James Montgomery Flagg was 64 when the US entered World War II, but he didn’t hesitate to step back into his role as a military poster artist.  The artist even posed as Uncle Sam in some of the designs (see image above), and he created other great WWII posters for the Air Force, the Marines, the Red Cross and others.  We currently have poster below in our collection, which revives the imagery of Flagg’s “I Want You” poster to encourage the public to get a war job – list of positions included! Few American illustrators successfully created such a legacy as did Flagg.  The demand for his original advertising posters is a good indicator of where the original advertising poster stands in today’s marketplace.

Flagg, I Need Your Skills in a War Job, 1943

*Poster auctions International

Images from Wikipedia and “James Montgomery Flagg” by Susan E. Meyer

This post was written by Elizabeth Norris, Owner Vintage European Posters, and edited by Emily Jackson, UC Berkeley Art History Student and Gallery Assistant  www.vepca.com

Vintage European Posters was established in 1997. We are the West Coast’s Largest Dealer in Original Vintage Posters from France and the United States. See us online anytime at www.vepca.com and at our Berkeley Showroom OUTPOST 2201 Fourth Street, Tuesdays and Thursdays

A Little Taste of Benedictine

Vintage advertising posters tell us what products were in demand in the past and how those ‘brands’ reached out to consumers.  In the Vintage European Posters Blog this month, we will take a look at some of the original vintage posters from our collection which advertise legendary liquor brands, how manufacturers explained their product in posters, and how the product  looks to today’s consumer.

Benedictine Liqueur*

Benedictine is an herbal liqueur, said to have medicinal properties.  The recipe was developed  in the  Benedictine Abbey in Normandy by a Monk, Don Bernardo Vincelli, and contains 27 herbs and spices. The primary herbs are Angelica, Hyssop and Lemon Balm, and the distilled liquor is aged 17 months before it goes to market.

The recipe is closely guarded – only 3 people at a time are privy to it, and the brand has been  imitated countless times, so much so that at the distillery there is a rogue’s gallery of counterfeits! Benedictine is an ingredient in the Singapore Sling, some drink it neat, but it is probably most famously enjoyed as a B & B – Benedictine and Brandy.

Anonymous, Benedictine, c. 1890

This poster was created in the 1890′s in France.  It measures 41.5 inches by 57.5 inches and has some light folds with professional water reversible restoration.  The Parisian printer Imprimeries Lemercier went to great lengths to capture the detail of this beautiful design.  The poster features the gothic architecture of the Norman Abbey and the sense of history associated with the brand. The crests across the top of the poster suggest nobility.   The piece also has a tax stamp, just below the B which shows that the poster was hung outdoors and a municipal display tax was paid.

In the Bay Area today, there are many great watering holes featuring mixologists who use Benedictine in their palette.  Visit Flora’s new bar “Fauna” in the Uptown District, or Bourbon and Branch in San Francisco for a taste of this legendary liquor.  Having a hard time finding Benedictine? Try a good bottle shop like Ledger’s Liquor on University Avenue in Berkeley, very close to our Berkeley Showroom.

You can see this poster, and the VEP Collection at St. Christopher Antique Show February 1-3 in San Jose.  The show is a benefit for the St. Christopher’s School in Willow Glen.

2278 Booksin Avenue, San Jose
Friday February 1, 11am-8pm
Saturday February 2, 11am-8pm
Sunday February 3,  10am-2pm

VEP’s booth at the St. Christopher Antique Show last year

*Image from Wikipedia

This post was written by Elizabeth Norris, Owner Vintage European Posters, and edited by Emily Jackson, UC Berkeley Art History Student and Gallery Assistant  www.vepca.com

Vintage European Posters was established in 1997. We are the West Coast’s Largest Dealer in Original Vintage Posters from France and the United States. See us online anytime at www.vepca.com and at our Berkeley Showroom OUTPOST 2201 Fourth Street, Tuesdays and Thursdays

Honoring WWI and the Strasbourg Statue

Galland, Statue of Strasbourg, 1918

In honor of Veterans Day, still known as Armistice Day in France, we decided to take a look at our collection of WWI posters. This particular poster, designed by the prolific poster artist Andre Galland, celebrates the unveiling of the Strasbourg Statue on Armistice Day 1918. The Strasbourg Statue depicts a woman as the personification of Strasbourg, the capital of the Alsace region in France. It is located in the Place de la Concorde, the largest public square in Paris, and is accompanied by personifications of the seven other capital cities: Bordeaux, Brest, Lille, Lyon, Marseille, Nantes, and Rouen.

Statue of Strasbourg in Place de la Concorde, Paris

The Alsace region was lost  was lost to Germany in 1871 at the end of the Franco-Prussian War, and was only returned to France at the end of WWI. On Armistice Day November 11, 1918, when Alsace and her capital Strasbourg were once again united with France, the French people honored her statue in the Place de la Concorde.  In celebration of the end of the war, and the return of the Alsace region, she was draped in French Tricolor flags and garlands, which we can see in Galland’s poster.

The inscription at the bottom of the poster reads:

The Statue of Strasbourg, erected like the other cities of France on the Place de la Concorde in Paris, was piously decorated with tricolor flags by the people of Paris … On the evening of the armistice, she shines in the light of the party victory!

The artist, Andre Galland, continued to be a successful poster artist in the decades after WWI, designing posters for the French National Lottery, and several French fertilizer companies like the one below.

Galland, Superguano, c. 1925

Like Galland’s Strasbourg Armistice Day poster, there were many posters, French, British, and American alike, that were printed to celebrate the end of such a devastating tragedy. Now, almost a century later, we still remember the end of the war, and remember those soldiers who have fought in wars around the world.

Christy, Americans All! 1919

This post was written by Emily Jackson, UC Berkeley Art History Student and Gallery Assistant, and edited by Elizabeth Norris, Owner Vintage European Posters  www.vepca.com

Vintage European Posters was established in 1997. We are the West Coast’s Largest Dealer in Original Vintage Posters from France and the United States. See us online anytime at www.vepca.com and at our Berkeley Showroom OUTPOST 2201 Fourth Street, Tuesdays and Thursdays

As well as at pop up open weekends (sign our mailing list to receive updates about pop-ups)