Representing Cinema and the Art of the Film Poster

Representing Cinema and the Art of the Film Poster consists of 75 original film posters from around the world, dating from 1924 to 1978. Selected from the collection of guest curator Otto Buj, the exhibition includes rare items from the United States, the Soviet Union, Poland, Czechoslovakia, France, Italy, Japan, West Germany, Austria, Sweden, and Denmark, among others. These posters illustrate how artists and designers, often incluencedby contemporary art movements, subjected the filmaker’s vision to fresh and idiosyncratic interpretations. As advertising asignments, they exceed the formulas of film marketing to represent their subject in a novel and provocative manner. What distinguishes them from the conventional model is that the artist was not motivated to glorify celebrity, illustrate dramatic high points, or employ the bombastic cutlines and typography that typify many of the film posters that we are accustomed to seeing. Instead, the artists chose to address an implicit or essential aspect of the film, preparing the viewer for a complex and subjective relationship with what they were about to see in the theatre. A number of pieces in this exhibitioon are either unique or one of only a few compies known to exists.

While these posters can be enjoyed as works of art or historical documents, the viewer is enouraged to become familiar with the films they represent. Given that the same experience also served as the commissioned artist’s sourse of inspiration, to see both the film and the poster would engage the view in a new, complex, and satisfying dialogue between the filmmaker, the artists, and the audience.