Usage Conditions May Apply Usage Conditions Apply There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page. IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and image viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. More - https://iiif.si.edu View Manifest View in Mirador Viewer Usage Conditions May Apply Usage Conditions Apply There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page. IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and image viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. More - https://iiif.si.edu View Manifest View in Mirador Viewer Usage Conditions May Apply Usage Conditions Apply There are restrictions for re-using this media. For more information, visit the Smithsonian's Terms of Use page. IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and image viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. More - https://iiif.si.edu View Manifest View in Mirador Viewer

Fly Now: The National Air and Space Museum Poster Collection

Throughout their history, posters have been a significant means of mass communication, often with striking visual effect. Wendy Wick Reaves, the Smithsonian Portrait Gallery Curator of Prints and Drawings, comments that "sometimes a pictorial poster is a decorative masterpiece-something I can't walk by without a jolt of aesthetic pleasure. Another might strike me as extremely clever advertising … But collectively, these 'pictures of persuasion,' as we might call them, offer a wealth of art, history, design, and popular culture for us to understand. The poster is a familiar part of our world, and we intuitively understand its role as propaganda, promotion, announcement, or advertisement."

Reaves' observations are especially relevant for the impressive array of aviation posters in the National Air and Space Museum's 1300+ artifact collection. Quite possibly the largest publicly-held collection of its kind in the United States, the National Air and Space Museum's posters focus primarily on advertising for aviation-related products and activities. Among other areas, the collection includes 19th-century ballooning exhibition posters, early 20th-century airplane exhibition and meet posters, and twentieth-century airline advertisements.

The posters in the collection represent printing technologies that include original lithography, silkscreen, photolithography, and computer-generated imagery. The collection is significant both for its aesthetic value and because it is a unique representation of the cultural, commercial and military history of aviation. The collection represents an intense interest in flight, both public and private, during a significant period of its technological and social development.

 Display Status

This object is not on display at the National Air and Space Museum. It is either on loan or in storage.
Object Details
Country of Origin Australia Type ART-Posters, Original Art Quality Medium Poster, Advertising, Commercial Aviation Sponsor Qantas (Queensland & Northern Territory Aerial Services Ltd.)
 Physical Description australia FLY QANTAS. Color offset photolithograph print advertising service to Australia with a collage of Australian scenes. At the top is a large photograph of a woman scuba diving in Coral Cave. Beneath is the text “Australia, Fly Qantas” in a modern sans-serif font. In the bottom half is a series of images, clockwise from the upper left: Ayers Rock (Uluru) in the Northern Territory, Smiggin Holes ski resort in New South Wales, Dunk Island on the Barrier Reef, the Todd River in the Northern Territory, and a sheep ranch at Tarwa near Canberra. In the center of these photographs is a small iconographic drawing of a koala bear. Full text at bottom: Australia’s Round-The-World Airline. Dimensions 2-D - Unframed (H x W): 101 × 63.5cm (3 ft. 3 3/4 in. × 2 ft. 1 in.)
 Inventory Number A19960143000 Credit Line Gift of the Washington Airline Society Data Source National Air and Space Museum Restrictions & Rights Usage conditions apply
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