Saturday, June 18, 2011

Paris and posters

                   

Here's a page from my sketchbook, revisited with the odds and ends that always find their way into my pockets.

These Colonnes Morrispart of the Parisian landscape since the mid-1800's—are advertising pillars originally built to combat rampant advertising and graffiti. Some of them contain telephones and automatic public toilets.  And sometimes—startlingly— they serve as a broom cupboard for street cleaners.



Here's a Colonne Morris (seen from my local café on Fontaine Saint Michel)—also doubles as as hat!)

But most of all, they are adorned with beautiful posters: only those advertising cultural events (films, concerts, theatre, etc) are permitted. With such a steady stream of work (some of it publically funded) and abundant places to display it in, the flowering of French poster art was the inevitable result.  From Toulouse-Lautrec and Alphonse Mucha, to A.MCassandre and Raymond Savignac and Hervé Morvan, not to mention André François, Nathan-Garamond and Jean-Michel Folon —they all contributed to the rich visual feast on the streets here.

Newer practitioners you may want to look at:
In general:
Road trip, anyone?

11 comments:

  1. Love your sketch/collage, with a flying sticker! And how cool is it to see that you're a fellow fan of Zeloot? Thanks for introducing me to Michel Batory and Michel Quarez, too - wonderful stuff.

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  2. very beautiful and inspiring your illustration (i can hardly call it a sketch) with a twist of miroslav sasek!

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  3. CARIN: Thanks! Zeloot is fantastic... and if you like poster art, this is a good place to be!

    GERTIE: That's very high praise — thank you very much!!

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  4. Thank you Anna — I love your blog too!!

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  5. Bonjour M.

    merci pour votre gentil mot sur mon blogue et c est un grand plaisir de découvrir le votre. :-)

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  6. Bienvenue, Manon — et merci!
    :-)))

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  7. Lovely pen and ink illustration!

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  8. Thanks, Jil... hello!!
    :-)))

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  9. Ahh love that illustration Maral, and how nice they're only used to display cultural posters :) Hope you had a lovely Bastille day! x

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  10. Merci, Laura— c'est gentille!!

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So... what do you think?