I’m back from a week on Bali, where we felt as relaxed and removed from the cares of life as a Japanese Batman.
Now it’s Friday night, and I’m not up to following up my earlier, incisive thoughts about Gerry Cohen on justice and equality (soon, soon). Let’s just look at pictures. I bought a CD of old images on eBay. I’m in the market for Victorian cards and such-like ephemera (suitable for the Photoshopping of squids all over them, and so forth.) Old posters and fun font fodder are also welcome. I want you to help me with this first item (which is justice and equality-related, if it comes to that):
Anti-union/anti-socialist propaganda. British? American? ‘Let’s hit while it’s hot’ seems to refer to some particular political action to be taken? But what? Strike-breaking? When is this from? The 30’s? Would this sort of ‘shut up and get back to work, workers’ message ever really have had any resonance with the intended audienc?
This next one complements the first, by emphasizing the advantages of being forced to do two things, rather than the advantages of only doing one, even when doing two would probably be to your advantage.
I like it because the machine-like quality of the figures is irrelevantly sinister but cheerful. The next one is just somehow awesome and I think that cities encouraging carpooling should consider adopting a version for use today. (Just erase the second line and let the first stand as self-evident truth.)
Next – did you know that Hans Christian Andersen was some kind of Joseph Cornell avant le cut out lettres? See also the accompanying post here. Related images and good discussion here. And following that up, it turns out Victor Hugo was a great visual artist, too.
Japanese Batman courtesy of the new Chip Kidd edited valume, Bat-Manga!: The Secret History of Batman in Japan
But I think a shrewder purchase would be one of these cheap used copies of this Hans Christian Andersen art book
{ 23 comments }
m. 02.27.09 at 1:52 pm
Re: riding with Hitler . . . http://www.amazon.com/When-Ride-Alone-Laden-Limited/dp/1597775134/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1235742677&sr=1-2
Henry (not the famous one) 02.27.09 at 1:58 pm
It seems obvious (which doesn’t make it right) that the blacksmith poster is from WWII. The themes of “keep your mouth shut” and “let’s work together” don’t make sense together in any earlier era. And it may be urging higher productivity–a theme that the bosses never urged explicitly, at least not in poster form, in any other era.
Henry (not the famous one) 02.27.09 at 2:10 pm
Correction–certainly the “Export or Die” posters of postwar Britain disprove the last point. Dangers of overstating proved again.
John Holbo 02.27.09 at 2:32 pm
Damn, Bill Maher sure stole my joke.
As to the blacksmith poster. It doesn’t seem like a wartime theme. The idea is rather that he will have more business – get richer – if only he minds his own business. That is, if he doesn’t try to join a union, or whatever it is he’s not supposed to do.
Hogan 02.27.09 at 2:44 pm
Could it be the 1926 general strike? “Class solidarity is for suckers; let the miners solve their own problems.”
Rich Puchalsky 02.27.09 at 2:53 pm
A CD of old-time images of unknown provenance? I wonder how long it will be before contemporary graphic designers just start fabricating these things a la Man in the High Castle. “Look, I made a blacksmith picture with a vaguely unsympathetic rightist theme; should appeal to the people who buy these things.” Or maybe the ride-along-with-Hitler one never was actually from WW II; it was just made by the Sierra Club last year or something.
Righteous Bubba 02.27.09 at 3:02 pm
I imagine a Disneyesque outline of A Nerd beneath STAY STRONG FOR TLÖN.
jholbo 02.27.09 at 3:15 pm
“A CD of old-time images of unknown provenance? I wonder how long it will be before contemporary graphic designers just start fabricating these things a la Man in the High Castle.”
Nonono. It will be a bunch of Chinese ex-WoW goldfarmers. Poor starving third-worlders, willing to Fark old images for $1 a day.
Rich Puchalsky 02.27.09 at 3:29 pm
Wait, though — could poor starving third-worlders really get the ironic appeal right? Surely this is one of those jobs that can’t really be outsourced. Only real Americans can make real fake American hipster gear. We’re #1! U.S.A.!, U! S! A! Excuse me.
Adam Roberts 02.27.09 at 4:15 pm
On the ‘one iron in the fire’ poster: this site suggests it was one of a series of general ‘on the job’ posters; nothing so specific as strike-busting, just generalised ‘buck your ideas up, workers!’ wall decor. Other slogans include: ‘Warning! Consider the possible consequences if you are careless in your work’; ‘The Perfect Finish, No jobs done till it’s ALL done, only full days make full records’ and my favourite ‘Wish or Work?, Those who really want a thing always work till they get it.’ ‘One Iron in the Fire, Those who mind their own business always have the most business to mind’ fits very neatly in that company.
Phil 02.27.09 at 4:30 pm
I imagine a Disneyesque outline of A Nerd beneath STAY STRONG FOR TLÖN.
I remember that one, but it wasn’t just a nerd – it was definitely Joe Chip.
rea 02.27.09 at 5:15 pm
Is Japanese Batman supposed to be an avatar of Jesus? He resuurected himself with the strength of righteousness . . .
roy belmont 02.27.09 at 7:15 pm
Undercutting the ex-WoW goldfarmers and their keepers by offering noble companionship, for free.
@LoC
Claudia 02.27.09 at 8:16 pm
Unevaluated information from the Interweb:
ONE IRON IN THE FIRE, LET’S HIT WHILE IT’S HOT lithograph in colours, 1929, printed by Mather & Co., Chicago, minor nicks and tears 44 x 36in. (112 x 92cm.).
From: http://www.invaluable.com
ingrid robeyns 02.27.09 at 9:07 pm
I was in a car sharing system for many years and have seen many different types of arguments (well, slogans) but this one really beats all of them. If someone would have told me that this poster was ever made, I would not have believed them, not even for a second.
Robert Hanks 02.27.09 at 9:11 pm
It’s by Willard Frederic Elmes, and it’s one of a series called Mather Work Incentive posters, printed in Chicago in the Twenties.
Ginger Yellow 02.27.09 at 9:43 pm
Bat Manga! is awesome. It’s a shame the typeface is so lame, though.
Aunt FLo 02.27.09 at 11:02 pm
There are a load of those Mather Work Incentives here.
I recognise one on the second page from behind Larry David’s desk in CYE.
John Holbo 02.28.09 at 12:31 am
“It’s a shame the typeface is so lame, though.”
Yeah, I have to agree with that. Chip Kidd is responsible. He writes that he doesn’t like handwriting fonts, which he thinks ‘look like bad toupes’. But Gotham – although a cute font name joke – is not a good choice for this book.
Thanks for solving the mystery of the Mather Work Incentive poster, Adam!
onymous 02.28.09 at 1:19 am
Holy shit! That Victor Hugo art is amazing.
ben wolfson 02.28.09 at 7:28 am
I agree with onymous.
Charles S 02.28.09 at 10:03 am
Perhaps he could have gotten the publisher to spring for a letterer? I doubt they cost much these days.
John Holbo 02.28.09 at 10:39 am
“Perhaps he could have gotten the publisher to spring for a letterer?”
I neither fully understand nor, to any degree, endorse Kidd’s choice of Gotham. He points out that it wasn’t hand lettered in the original. So hiring a hand-letterer wouldn’t have ‘preserved’ anything. Fair enough. I guess the alternative would have been to mimic crappy typesetting – whatever the original was like. But I suppose it’s fair to point out that it’s not clear what Latin font or face is ‘equal’ to the original. Serif? Sans-serif? I would have gone for some nice Blambot-style hand-lettering-mimicking toupee of a font.
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