- About Bookbinding -

Pictorial Poster

If "Post no Bills" were the universal law nowadays, those of us who have the good fortune to live in Paris or in New York would be deprived of one of the most interesting manifestations of modern decorative art. Perhaps it is not wholly unfair to suggest that this nineteenth century of ours is a day of little things, and that our silver. ware, our pottery, our tiles, our wall-paper, our woodcuts, our book covers, each in its kind, and when it is at its best, are better than our historic painting, our heroic sculpture, or our grandiose architecture. The minor arts have their place in the hierarchy of the beautiful; and more often than we are willing to acknowledge, they have a charm of their own and a value likely to be as lasting as those of their more pretentious elder sisters. The idyls of Theocritus and the figurines from Tanagra are these so tiny that we can afford to despise them?

We are all of us prone to underestimate the value of contemporary labor when it is bestowed on' common things. Often we fail altogether to see the originality, the elegance, the freshness, in a word, the art, - of the men who are making the things which encompass us roundabout. Possibly the Greek did not consider the beauty of the vase he used daily, the form of which is a pure joy to us; and probably the Oriental worker at the 100m cannot guess the pleasure we shall take in his subtle commingling of colour in the wools of the rug he is weaving. So it is small wonder that the pictorial posters which adorn our blank walls pass by unperceived, and that we do not care to observe the skill which has gone to their making. Yet the recent development of the pictorial poster in France and in America is worthy of careful consideration by all who take note of the artistic currents of our time.

More than once has this or that distinguished French painter or architect stooped to design a poster for the play or for the book of some friend. But for the most part the posters of these artists are muddled and ineffective; they lack the solid simplicity of motive which is the essential of a good advertisement; they are without the bold vigor of design which the poster demands; and they are without the compression and relief of lettering which it requires. These are qualities which the ordinary artist, not seeking, has not achieved, perhaps because he half despised his task. These are the qualities which no one could fail to find in the work of the masters of the poster in France, M. Jules Cheret, M. Willette, M. Grasset. In their advertisements we discover a perfect understanding of the conditions of this form of pictorial art.

The first of these conditions is that the poster shall attract attention at all costs; and the second is that it shall satisfy the eye at all hazards. Thus we see that the 'pester may be noisy, - and noisy it often is, no doubt, - but it must not be violent, just as even a brass band ought ever to play in tune. And the paper-cover is a younger sister of the pictorial poster. The conditions under which paper-covers can be effective and accomplish their purpose are the same as those under which the pictorial poster is restrained.

Indeed, the alliance between these two forms of chromatic decoration had been close for some time. Certain of M. Cheret's boldest and most vigorous compositions were for the purpose of advertising new books or new editions _ M. Robida's "Rabelais," for example, and the" Three Musketeers" of the elder Dumas.

Perhaps the point of contact is to be sought in the wrappers for sheet-music and for the scores of operas. The drawing prepared by M. Georges Clairin for M. Massenet's opera "Le Cid" had been enlarged to serve as a poster; and in like manner M. Willette's delightfully characteristic design of the old and the young Pierrots for the witty and pathetic pantomime of " L'Enfant Prodigue" did double duty.