The Wolfsonian in Miami Beach Shows British Transport Art Posters

Written by Thomas Schneider Saturday, 07 May 2011 21:02

Miami Beach, FL.- "Art for British Posters For Transport" is on view at the Wolfsonian in Miami Beach, Florida until August 14th. This Wolfsonian–Florida International University exhibition explores the evolution of transport posters in twentieth-century Britain, and features outstanding examples executed for both the London Underground and the British railways. The exhibition, on view from April 15, through August 14, is organized by the Yale Center for British Art. The title of the show, Art for All, is taken from an exhibition held at the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1948 (organized by the V&A and London Transport), which featured original works of art, the maquettes for the posters. This exhibition contains the art truly seen by all: the posters themselves. Art for All presents more than eighty masterpieces from the Yale Center for British Art, many of them donated to the Yale Center by Henry S. Hacker, Yale College, Class of 1965. In addition, the installation will include works from The Wolfsonian collection that complement the exhibition.

Art for All traces the changing graphic styles from the second decade of the twentieth century through the 1970s and highlights specific features such as the career of Edward McKnight Kauffer, the work of women artists, how the posters were initially displayed, and the larger implications of these advertising campaigns. “Art for All continues The Wolfsonian’s exploration of the role that graphic design (and design in general) plays in shaping our everyday life experiences,” notes Sarah Schleuning, The Wolfsonian’s curator. “The London Underground’s diverse yet distinct advertising campaign to encourage ridership and promote goodwill among citizens is considered one of the landmark design programs in modern history.”  In 1908 under the leadership of Frank Pick, the London Underground (later, London Transport), began a promotional campaign that became one of the most successful, adventurous, and best sustained branding operations ever attempted. The posters commissioned by Pick engendered goodwill and encouraged ridership on the public transport system.

They also helped to foster a civic identity for the city of London.  A string of major artists, including Edward McKnight Kauffer, Frederick Herrick, Hans Schleger, and Anna Zinkeisen worked for Pick. From 1923, when numerous British railway companies were amalgamated into four lines: the Great Western Railway (GWR), the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER), the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) and the Southern Railway (SR), until the  nationalization of the railways in 1948, the “Big Four” followed Pick’s lead in mounting their own poster campaigns. While none of the British rail lines matched the scope and ambition of the Underground campaign, some of the same artists, such as Kauffer, and Walter Spradbery, also designed for the mainline railways. Other no less gifted artists, such as Tom Purvis and Frank Newbould, created extraordinary graphics for the railways.

The Wolfsonian is a museum, library, and research center that uses objects to illustrate the persuasive power of art and design, to explore what it means to be modern, and to tell the story of social, historical, and technological changes that have transformed our world. The mission of The Wolfsonian as a museum and research center is reflected in its multidisciplinary approach to looking at objects as both agents and expressions of change. It does so through exhibitions, publications, educational programs, and individual scholarship. While these objects can best be understood in the context in which they were created, they illuminate as much about our times as they reveal about their own. The collections comprise approximately 120,000 objects from the period of 1885 to 1945—the height of the Industrial Revolution to the end of the Second World War—in a variety of media including furniture; industrial-design objects; works in glass, ceramics, and metal; rare books; periodicals; ephemera; works on paper; paintings; textiles; and medals. The Wolfsonian is located at 1001 Washington Avenue, Miami Beach, FL. Visit the museum's website at: ttp://www.wolfsonian.org

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