Picture Posters/Chapter 8

by Charles Hiatt

 

CHAPTER VIII.

THE WORK OF OTHER CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH DESIGNERS.

Since this book was commenced as the companion, rather than the rival, of that of M. Maindron, English designers of the poster have multiplied in a degree altogether phenomenal.

Up to the time in question, as we have already seen, the English artist who attempted the poster was exceptional. The famine, which was prevalent only a year or two ago, has become the abundance of today, so that where one expected a dearth of subject matter, one has in fact: an excess. It seems to me that, apart from the English pioneers, whom we have already considered, the brothers Beggarstaff, in reality Messrs. Pryde and Simpson, two young artists, are entitled to the first place among the makers of the English artistic poster. They have best appreciated the essence of their business: less than almost any native designers, they are innocent of any homage of imitation. They have imitated neither Chéret nor Lautrec: it may well be that they have had the wisdom to take a hint here and there from both of these masters of the art of the affiche. As yet the hoardings of London are screaming with the vulgar designs of the advertiser's hack. The admirable art of the Beggarstaffs is, up to now, infrequently met with. Their curious advertisement for Sir Henry Irving's production of "Becket," was eclipsed by that done for the same manager's "Don Quixote," while the latter has to give place to one intended to announce a special issue of "Harper's Magazine." All of these force themselves on the collector's attention. They are at once striking and artistic; they cry their wares well, and they are a delight to the eyes. The lettering in the Harper poster is beyond all praise. Of its kind, it is the most beautiful English lettering of which I know. At the Aquarium Exhibition the Beggarstaff’s showed four posters which advertised Nobody's Blue, Nobody's Candles, Nobody's Niggers, and Nobody's Pianos. If each "Nobody" is not rapidly converted into "Somebody," the various manufacturers and proprietors of the articles mentioned above must be very stupid people. All were excellent; that which advertised Nobody's Pianos was a most curious and a most original performance. It seems to me that the Beggarstaffs have few serious rivals in England, and not very many in France. Their works should help very

 

DESIGN BY THE BROTHERS BEGGARSTAFF.

considerably in the task of revolutionizing the English pictorial poster. The

 

impression created by their designs on Frenchmen, who are past masters in the art of the hoarding, is most favourable. It will be remembered that when Mr. Sickert took it into his head to depict the Sisters Lloyd in their music-hall habit, the critics fell out greatly. Even the young ladies in question had, it is. said, scant affection for a design in which everything was suggested and nothing declared. They had, it is true, the recompense of advertisement, and that, to a music-hall singer, is a very sweet recompense. It was characteristic

of Mr. Sickert that he should go to the music-halls for a subject. The "New English Art Club" is devoted to things which are

 

DESIGN BY THE BROTHERS BEGGARSTAFF.

 

new and strange, the artistic poster amongst them. Mr. Sickert is not the only one of the members of this club who have made an essay in the latest form of applied art. Mr. Beardsley, Mr. R. Anning Bell, and Mr.

 

DESIGN BY THE BROTHERS BEGGARSTAFF.

 

DESIGN BY THE BROTHERS BEGGARSTAFF.

 

DESIGN BY THE BROTHERS BEGGARSTAFF.

Wilson Steer are amongst those of his colleagues who have done the same thing. Mr. Sickert's poster, which is, I believe, as yet unpublished, is in four colours. It is calculated to make a good advertisement, and one can only hope soon to meet with it on the hoardings. As an impressionist painter of talent, Mr. Wilson Steer is as well known as Mr. Sickert. A "New English Art Club" Exhibition without his work would be one which lacked a most characteristic feature. Mr. Steer gave us an opportunity of appreciating his talent as a painter by organizing a show of his own work. To advertise this he did a poster, which was excellent of its kind, and is in consequence very rare. It is a comparatively small lithograph in four colours, and is quite unlike this artist's other work. It leans, it seems to me, towards Pre-Raphaelitism rather than towards Impressionism. An artist who has certainly sat at the feet of Mr. Whistler is Mr. Mortimer Menpes. To advertise several exhibitions of his paintings, he has invented at least three posters, which certainly do not lack the merit of originality. He has abstained from the frivolous girl and grotesque man. The "France," the "Venice," and the "India" are in their way considerable achievements in dainty design and quiet and harmonious colour. Mr. Menpes, by being intentionally simple, has arrived at notable conspicuity. All this artist's signs are of small size, and are appropriate rather to the notice board than to the hoarding. Nothing more opposite to the fastidious productions of Mr. Menpes could be conceived than the vigorous poster by Mr. Lockhart Bogle advertising a Scottish Athletic Gathering, held in 1892. This is a large lithograph, consisting of a single figure of a Highlander, which, if not remarkably beautiful, is drawn with vigour and with no small accuracy. Mr. Brangwyn is one of those English painters of whom we are entitled to be proud. His directness, the audacity of his impressionism, the splendour (if sometimes ill-considered) of his colour schemes, cannot be passed over even by those who have slight sympathy with his method. That, if so inclined, he would produce a poster at once startling and artistic is not to be denied. The one which he has already designed to advertise an exhibition of South African pictures by himself and Mr. William Hunt, held at the Japanese Gallery, is certainly by no means worthy his remarkable talent, and one trusts that he will cease for a moment from painting pictures and produce a poster which shall be memorable in the history of the affiche in England.

Mr. Frank Richards is nothing if not versatile; his exhibition, held recently at the Dowdeswells’ Galleries, came as a surprise to all who were unacquainted with his

 

DESIGN BY P. WILSON STEER.

 

DESIGN BY LEWIS BAUMER.

 

DESIGN BY L. RAVEN-HILL.

clever painting. In this exhibition his pictures ranged from a large study of Mr. Clive as "Hamlet" to slight but beautiful studies of Venice under various atmospheric conditions. In his poster work, of which at present little has been seen, Mr. Richards shows that, to some extent, he is under the influence of Mr. Dudley Hardy. Mr. Richards, no less than Mr. Hardy, is undeniably up to date, and his work is really effective. Among the most recent additions to the ranks of our popular illustrators is Mr. Lewis Baumer. One meets with his work everywhere; in "To-Day" and in the short lived "Unicorn." His bills to advertise the Academy students' annual burlesque are pretty, if they are nothing else. Mr. Baumer has certainly still to make his mark as a poster designer. The Artistic Supply Company, who are paying special attention to the pictorial poster, have already produced a dainty little affiche by him. It may be noted here that the company in question have arranged with some of the most eminent English designers for the reproduction of artistic posters, and that several, which illustrate these pages, do so only on account of their permission most generously given.

Among other services which the comic journal "Pick-Me-Up" has rendered to the artistic public is the extremely important one of emphasizing, and giving a congenial outlet to, the remarkable talent of Mr.

 

DESIGN BY L. RAVEN-HILL.

 

DESIGN BY SYDNEY ADAMSON.

Raven-Hill. From almost the first, his connection with the journal in question has been a very intimate one. Hardly a number is without a specimen of his powerful drawing and his gift of comic invention. While suggesting, in the best sense, the style of the incomparable Charles Keene, Mr. Raven-Hill's work in black and white is the outcome of his own personality. It would have been strange if this very modern artist had not produced pictorial posters: his talent was perfectly adapted to his doing so with success. His small bills for "Pick-Me-Up" are vigorous in drawing, bold in colour, and of a pleasant fantasy. They only measure twenty by thirty inches, but they are very telling. A complete set of them is a most desirable addition to the collector's portfolio. Another accomplished member of the staff of "Pick-Me-Up," Mr. Edgar Wilson, has designed a bill for the recently defunct journal, "The Unicorn." It is effective, but to me personally, the colour scheme is even more crude than the exigencies of a poster demand. Mr. Reginald Cleaver, whose sketches of scenes in the House of Commons created so favourable an impression in "The Daily Graphic," has not yet, I believe, deliberately produced a pictorial poster; but one of his drawings, reproduced on a large scale, lends itself well enough to the purposes of mural advertisement. Mr. Sydney Adamson, the art editor of "To-day" and "The Idler," has done a bill which, when it is seen, will be held, I have small doubt, a very striking performance. It is happily conceived and boldly executed, and should make a striking patch of colour on the hoardings.

Merely to chronicle the names of the innumerable Wilsons who are producing pictures would take quite a considerable space. It may be noted in passing that, like Edgar of that name, Mr. W. Wilson has also attempted an affiche.

Among others who have designed posters which have yet to be seen on the hoardings are Mr. Max Cowper, Mr. A. R. Miller, Mr. Kerr Lawson, Mr. F. H. Townsend, whose black and white work one meets everywhere, Mr. Roche, a prominent member of the Glasgow School, and one of the greatest living English artists, Mr. Phil May.

Mr. Phil May is not the only "Punch" man who has been seized with the prevailing mania for the production of posters, His colleague, Mr. Bernard Partridge, has already designed one which is reproduced in these pages. One associates Mr. Partridge with dainty and idyllic work rather than with work which is vigorous, but his first essay in the poster seems to me to be very promising. Mr. J. T. Manuel's work is as unlike that of Mr. Bernard Partridge as possible. His pictures might be by a clever member of the young French School who

 

DESIGN BY MAX COWPER.

 

DESIGN BY A.R. MILLAR.

 

DESIGN BY KERR LAWSON.

 

DESIGN BY BERNARD PARTRIDGE.

 

DESIGN BY CHARLES FFOULKES.

 

DESIGN BY CHARLES FFOULKES.

 

DESIGN BY LÉON SOLON.

 

DESIGN BY A. MORROW.

 

DESIGN BY A. MORROW.

 

DESIGN BY HEYWOOD SUMNER.

 

DESIGN BY HEYWOOD SUMNER.

have taken more than a hint from Forain. The designs for posters which Mr. Manuel exhibited at the Westminster Aquarium, if not so distinctive of his talent as his contributions in black and white to "Pick-Me Up," were not without definite merit. Of the three, that catalogued as "A Music-hall Singer" struck me as the best. It should be purchased by Miss Minnie Cunningham, for the likeness between her, and the young lady it represents, if accidental, is marvellous. Among young decorative painters of the day who are not mere imitators of such masters as Sir Edward Burne-Jones or Puvis de Chavannes, but have invented a style for themselves, must be included Mr. Charles Ffoulkes. The two examples of his poster-work here reproduced are as beautiful in colour as they are refined in pattern. Moreover, they proclaim themselves in loud tones. Their tones, however, are those of a silver trumpet rather than those of cymbal or of gong. At times Mr. Ffoulkes forsakes his lofty imaginings and depicts chic young ladies quite in the best French manner. Mr. L. Solon's poster, reproduced here, is a very characteristic example of his decorative style. In inventing it, the artist has clearly kept before him the fact that a poster cannot live by beauty alone; if, happily, there be beauty, there must of necessity be advertisement, else is failure inevitable.

 

DESIGN BY HEYWOOD SUMNER.

Very unlike Mr. Solon's poster are the affiches of Mr. Heywood Sumner; those which I reproduce here seem to me to be very characteristic of his graceful gift of design. Mr. Morrow is already an established favourite on the hoardings of London, and justly so in that his performances are of exceptional merit. His "Illustrated Bits"

 

DESIGN BY SIDNEY HAWARD.

 

is a radiant affair, and his "New Woman" makes quite a pretty picture. His works should certainly be collected.

Of Mr. R. Anning Bell it is not too much to say that for versatility only Mr. Walter Crane among English artists can be said to rival him, and, what is far more important, his success in a medley of mediums is not to be gainsaid. His poster for the Liverpool School of Art, over which he presides, is a magnificent piece of decoration, and nothing so fine, in its way, has ever been, seen on English hoardings. It takes one up to the Elgin marbles; it is an oasis of the classical in a desert of the new. I can only mention the following native artists, not previously considered, who have produced pictorial posters of interest: Mr. F. Barnard ("Everybody should read in the European School"), Mr. F. Simpson ("Land of the Midnight Sun," "To Norway Fjords"), Mr. Robert Fowler, R.I., whose poster for the Walker Art Gallery is here illustrated, Mr. Sidney Haward (p. 279), Mr. Skipworth ("An Artist's Model"), Mr. Skinner ("Pall Mall Magazine"), Mr. Starr Wood and Mr. A. G. Draper.

I have already remarked that the poster movement in this country amounts to a positive revolution. No young artist is satisfied unless he has a hand in the decoration of the hoardings; the gold frame is for the time forgotten, and all have their eyes on the lithographers stone. France has undoubtedly had a long start of us, but if she is to retain her supremacy she must look to her laurels. Our young men are beating at her doors, though beating only in a spirit of friendly rivalry. Happily, between England and France there is, at this moment, only one war—the war of the pictorial poster.

 

DESIGN BY ROBERT FOWLER, R.I.

 

DESIGN BY R. ANNING BELL.