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 esthetic 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, silk screen, photolithography, and computer-generated imagery. The collection is significant both for its esthetic 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.
- Object
KLM Proudly Presents the Royal Super Constellation
- Object
Nord Africa Aviazione Bengasi
- Object
Air Bleu Est un Message Aerien Economique Signe et...
- Object
Singapore Airlines 40 Years in Aviation
- Object
Air France Flèche d'Orient
- Object
Deutsche Luft Hansa
- Object
Join the Army Air Service Be An American Eagle!
- Object
British Aircraft
- Object
SAM Luftverkehr
- Object
British Airways Britain
- Object
Hawaii - Fly there on Northwest Orient
- Object
Thai Airlines Smooth as Silk. Now in Jumbo Size.