Posts Tagged ‘art’
Vintage Columbia
Sunday, September 18th, 2011
Vintage Movie Posters
From the beginning of cinema, film posters were loaned to theatres to promote a film, then returned to the film exchange or sent to the next theatre on the distribution circuit. If the harshness of the 1920s and 1930s kept movie posters out of the hands of the general public, the paper shortage of the war years also helped to keep movie memorabilia out of general circulation; so it is no surprise that film posters from the years of 1930 to 1945 are quite scarce. It is said that fewer than 20 copies of movie posters exist from most films made between 1930 and 1945. As the years went by more and more theatre owners did not bother to return the posters and they remained in theatre exchanges and warehouses. Over the years many of these collections have been bought by dealers and collectors resulting in a huge market for vintage movie posters. However, the majority of these posters were printed on inexpensive paper and were never intended to be collectable items.
When you look back into the 1930s and the films that were produced in this era only a handful of posters have ever surfaced and movie posters have become a hot commodity in today’s market. Major auction houses such as Christie’s and Sotheby’s are now auctioning movie posters regularly worldwide.
The market is constantly expanding; today’s new buyers are collecting their nostalgia from the 1960s and 1970s. Films like Breakfast at Tiffany’s, The Italian Job, Dirty Harry, and the Bond series are highly sought after, but some examples can still be bought at reasonable prices.
From the very beginning movie posters were a part of commerce, designed to get cinema goers to the box office. In 1890 a Frenchman called Jules Cheret is credited with producing the very best film poster, a lithograph designed to promote a short film entitled Projections Artistiques. Five years later, a poster for the Lumiere Brothers Arrival of a Train in 1895 was the first to depict an actual scene from the film. However, up until the early 1910s, the majority of early film posters were nothing more than a simple sheet of paper with little more than a block text. A typical poster for an early Edison film contained the movie title and a few words.
The situation changed with the birth of the Studio System, and by the mid 1910s such studios as Essanay, Biograph and Edison were each producing their own posters and developing their own advertising styles, title treatment, studio logo and slogan to distinguish their quality film from the rest of the studios. In this way, patrons could readily distinguish, for example, between an Edison morality play and a Biograph cliffhanger.
In the mid 1920s the major studios had each developed their own unique style that reflected their output. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (founded in 1924), with its Leo the Lion logo set the industry standard for movie posters, boasting many more stars than the rest. Befitting its position as top studio, MGM often hired established artists and illustrators for its posters, including Al Hirschfeld and Ted Ireland, to name just two. During the late 1920s through to the 1940s, MGM movie posters tended to be uncluttered and highly-polished pieces of art, with unusual graphic treatments, often featuring pastel graphics on white backgrounds. 20th Century Fox (founded as Fox in 1915 and merging with the 20th Century Corporation in 1935) is perhaps best known for elaborate dance features and musical films. The studio used brilliant and fanciful stone lithos to promote their product, and their posters are noted for their bright colours.
Paramount, founded in 1930, with its table of top stars, produced witty posters with a minimum of text. By contrast, Warner Bros., founded in 1923 adopted a punchy, no-frills style of movie poster, often dominated by a photo-montage design, in keeping with their catalogue of strong realistic fims. Columbia Pictures, despite its no-frills movie making, employed a bigger art department than any of the other studios.
Throughout the 1930s and 1940s their posters were consistently eye-catching and very rich in colour and also pioneered the fake colour process by which black and white still photographs were coloured and turned into poster art, a process quickly adopted by all the other studios. Universal Studio, founded in 1912, is the oldest in existance. During the 1920s and 1930s Universal movie posters were remarkable for their bold colour and dynamic compositon, with hardly any white space. It is no coincidence that the posters for their 1930s horror, serial and western movies are among the most highly prized by collectors.
Over the years movie posters have been produced in a huge variety of sizes ranging from a small handbill or a little midget window card up to road side billboard sized 24 sheets. But the most common size remains the standard one-sheet movie poster (roughly 27 inches wide by 40 inches tall) which has remained relatively unchanged since the early days of cinema and is still in use today. For bigger-budget films, the studios often created advance or teaser one-sheets that would announce the impending arrival of a film weeks and sometimes months ahead of its cinema booking. For other major releases, the studio often produced several different styles of one-sheet for the same film, one to show-case the action packed elements of the movie and the other to exploit the romance angle.
Film poster collection is stimulating and fun, combining the better of the two worlds of art and nostalgia and you are tracing the history of change in fashion, style and culture.
About the Author
if you would like more information on antiques and collectibles you can check out my blog http://www.favouritecollectables.com which is frequently updated and a good source for checking out information on your favourite collectibles.
Columbia Torpedo Vintage Restoration
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Columbia Calls World War I US Army Vintage COFFEE MUG $19.99 “High quality ceramic coffee mug made with only the highest quality materials. Mug is large 15 ounces, 4.75 inches tall, 3 inch diameter. Amazing rich colors and vivid images.”… |
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Columbia Records Porcelain Refrigerator Magnet $8.39 Porcelain enameled signs have been said to be a true reflection of the times. When used for advertising, the signs gave a brilliant permanence to the product. This magnet is an authentic reproduction utilizing the same process popularized in the early 1900’s. The colors are not paints but finely ground glass crystals which, when kiln fired at 1350 degrees Fahrenheit, fuse to the heavy steel plate…. |
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Wilton 63302 6-Inch Shop Vise $159.99 WILTON Shop Vises mount to your workbench.360° swivel base with double lockdown. Replaceable top jaws. Built in pipe jaws. Rubber pinch point safety guards. Large anvil work surface…. |
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Strom Plumbing Columbia Bridge P0550 12C Chrome Columbia bridge faucet with gooseneck spout by Strom Plumbing. Features a gooseneck spout and metal cross handles. Solid brass construction; modern ceramic quarter turn valves. Includes matching drain. Model P0550-8: 8 Inches centers. Model P0550-12: 12 Inches centers. Spout extension: 5 Inches. Overall height: 8 1/2 Inches. Base diameter: 2 7/8 Inches. Maximum counter thickness: 1 1/4 Inches. P05… |
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Strom Plumbing Columbia Bridge P0549 12S Super Coated Brass Columbia bridge faucet by Strom Plumbing. Features a straight spout and metal cross handles. Solid brass construction; modern ceramic quarter turn valves. Includes matching drain. Model P0549-8: 8 Inches centers. Model P0549-12: 12 Inches centers. Spout extension: 5 Inches. Overall height: 5 1/2 Inches. Base diameter: 2 7/8 Inches. Maximum counter thickness: 1 1/4 Inches. P0549-12S…. |
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Columbia Lions Navy ‘47 Brand Vintage Scrum T-shirt $38.99 Columbia Lions Navy ‘47 Brand Vintage Scrum T-shirt Size X-Large |
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Vintage $10.47 Vintage |
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Columbia Lions Women’s Navy ‘47 Brand Vintage Scrum T-shirt $34.99 Team spirit- comfort and style all wrapped into one shirt? Too good to be true you might say- but it is reality. With this Columbia Lions Women’s Navy ‘47 Brand Vintage Scrum T-shirt you will be sure to stand out as the Lions number one fan. This scrum tee features a distressed screenprint graphic of team name and logo. Wear this on campus and you will be sure to stand out. Lightweight tee Machine washable and easy to wear Officially licensed |
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Good Old Vintage $15.03 Good Old Vintage captures Duke Ellington & His Orchestra between 1942 and 1953 on 20 tracks originally recorded for RCA Victor, Columbia, and Capitol. It’s impossible to sum up over five decades of Ellingtoniana with 20 tracks, but this collection provide |
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North Carolina Tarheels 47 Brand Vintage Oath MVP Columbia Blue Snap back Hat $24.95 North Carolina Tarheels 47 Brand Vintage Oath MVP Columbia Blue Snap back Hat Help support your favorite team in this Retro Snap Back Hat from Twins Enterprises 47 Brand. Features embroidered logo’s stylish adjustable snap back and contrasting team colors for added style. Officially licensed. |
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Columbia Best Pictures Collection $108.76 This beautiful set showcases 11 of the timeless Columbia masterworks that have taken home the little golden man they call Oscar. Ranging from 1934, when sound was a relatively new modification to the medium, all the way through the golden ages of Hollywood to 1982, the films include IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT (1934), YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU (1938), ALL THE KING’S MEN (1949), FROM HERE TO ETERNITY (1953), ON THE WATERFRONT (1954), THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (1957), LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1962), A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS (1966), OLIVER! (1968), KRAMER VS. KRAMER (1979), and GANDHI (1982). The set also boasts a myriad of special features, including conversations, interviews, and retrospectives with John Milius, Lord Attenborough, Ben Kingsley, Frank Capra Jr., and Steven Spielberg, as well as lobby cards, documentaries, featurettes, vintage newsreel footage and making-ofs, and much more. See individual titles for synopsis information. |
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Cafe Columbia $5.93 Cafe Columbia |
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Montand [Columbia] $15.89 Montand [Columbia] |
