Posters by Unknowns

Anonymous Printmaker
The Evening Star
ca. 1895
lithograph (poster)
Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington

Anonymous Printmaker
Philadelphia Sunday Press
ca. 1895
lithograph (poster)
Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington

Anonymous Printmaker
Borussia Malz-Bier
ca. 1898
lithograph (poster)
Kunstbibliothek, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Anonymous Printmaker
Ault & Wiborg Co. - Printing Inks 
ca. 1900
lithograph (poster)
Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington

Anonymous Printmaker
Gand Hôtel Royal, Stockholm
ca. 1905
lithograph (poster)
Kunstbibliothek, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Anonymous Printmaker
Grand Hotel Eden, Nervi
ca. 1905
lithograph (poster)
Kunstbibliothek, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Anonymous Printmaker
Avoid Colds - Dress Properly
ca. 1905
lithograph (poster)
Allard Pierson Museum, Amsterdam

Anonymous Printmaker
Wanted - Red Blooded Men
1914
lithograph (poster)
Dallas Museum of Art

Anonymous Printmaker
Boys - Come over here - you're wanted
ca. 1915
lithograph (poster)
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Anonymous Printmaker
Winter in Switzerland
ca. 1928
lithograph (poster)
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Anonymous Printmaker
Telling the Enemy
ca. 1940-45
lithograph (poster)
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Anonymous Printmaker
Cut Your Loaf This Way
ca. 1947
lithograph (poster)
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Anonymous Printmaker
Chambers Brothers
Avalon Ballroom, San Francisco
1967
lithograph (poster)
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Anonymous Printmaker
Nureyev
ca. 1975
offset print (poster)
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Anonymous Printmaker
La Révolution Française au Musée Carnavalet
1939
lithograph (poster)
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Anonymous Printmaker
Great Leap Forward in Production
ca. 1978
lithograph (poster)
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Mirror Image

Tonight I saw myself in the dark window as

the image of my father, whose life

was spent like this,

thinking of death, to the exclusion

of other sensual matters,

so in the end that life

was easy to give up, since

it contained nothing: even

my mother's voice couldn't make him

change or turn back

as he believed

that once you can't love another human being

you have no place in the world. 

– Louise Glück (1990)

Visual Relics (1961-1963)

Eikoh Hosoe
Ordeal by Roses no. 32 (Yukio Mishima)
1961
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Ray Metzker
Valencia
1961
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Ray Metzker
Philadelphia
1963
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Ray Metzker
63-E-8-Phila
1963
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Robert Brownjohn
Servants
1961
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Robert Brownjohn
Smoke Extract
1961
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Robert Brownjohn
Tradesmen's Entrance
1961
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Robert Brownjohn
Twinlock
1961
gelatin silver print
Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Robert Gene Wilcox
The Oval Window, Two Harbors, Minnesota
1962
gelatin silver print
Minneapolis Institute of Art

Frederick Sommer
Lee Nevin
1963
gelatin silver print
Los Angeles County Museum of Art

Kati Horna
Untitled (from Ode to Necrophilia)
1962
gelatin silver print
Princeton University Art Museum

Irving Penn
Francis Bacon, London
1962
gelatin silver print
Art Institute of Chicago

Evelyn Hofer
Flower Show, London
1962
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

Evelyn Hofer
Locks, St James Street, London
(James Lock & Co, the city's oldest-established hatter)
1962
gelatin silver print
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

David Vestal
Madison Square, New York City
1963
gelatin silver print
Art Institute of Chicago

Eddie Adams
Mrs Kennedy receiving Flag
1963
AP wirephoto
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia

Here is the account in the twenty-fourth fascicle of the Ekottara-āgama: "There are thirty-three angels and one archangel, and the signs of death in them are fivefold. Their flowered crowns wither, their robes are soiled, the hollows under their arms are fetid, they lose their awareness of themselves, they are abandoned by the jeweled maidens." 

And The Life of the Buddha, fifth fascicle: "There are five signs that the allotted time has run out. The flowers in the hair fade, a fetid sweat comes from under the arms, the robes are soiled, the body ceases to give off light, it loses awareness of itself."

And the last fascicle of the Mahāmāyā-sūtra: "And at that time Mahā gave forth in the heavens five signs of her decay. Her crown of flowers wilted, a sweat poured from under her arms, her halo faded, here eyes came to blink without pause, she lost all satisfaction with her rightful place."

So far the similarities are more striking than the variations. The Abhidharma-mahāvibhāsā-sāstra describes the five greater signs and the five lesser signs in considerable detail. The five lesser signs are first. 

As an angel soars and pirouettes it usually gives forth music so beautiful that no musician, no orchestra or chorus can imitate it; but as death approaches the music fades and the voice becomes tense and thin.

In normal times, day and night, there floods from within an angel a light that permits of no shadows; but as death approaches the light dwindles sharply and the body is wrapped in thin shadows.

The skin of an angel is smooth and well anointed, and even if it immerses itself in a lake of ambrosia it throws off the liquid as does the leaf of a lotus; but as death approaches, water clings and will not leave.

 At most times an angel, like a spinning wheel of fire, neither stops nor is apprehensible in one place, it is there when it is here, it dodges and moves and throws itself free; but when death approaches, it lingers in one spot and cannot break free.

An angel exudes unblinking strength, but as death approaches the strength departs and blinking becomes incessant.

Here are the five greater signs: the once-immaculate robes are soiled, the flowers in the flowery crown fade and fall, sweat pours from the armpits, a fetid stench envelops the body, the angel is no longer happy in its proper place. 

It will be seen that the other sources enumerate the greater signs. So long as only the lesser ones are present, death can still be put off, but once the greater signs appear the issue is not in doubt. 

– Yukio Mishima, The Decay of the Angel, translated by Edward G. Seidensticker (Knopf, 1974)

London Photographs by Wolfgang Suschitsky (1912-2016)

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Lyons Corner House, Tottenham Court Road, London
1934
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
East End, London
ca. 1934
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
East End, London
ca. 1936
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Charing Cross Road
ca. 1936
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

"Although born in Vienna, the photographer and cinematographer Wolfgang Suschitzky, who has died at 104, forged his career in the UK where, as a Jew and a socialist, he took refuge in the 1930s.  His best-known photographs remain those taken at dawn on Charing Cross Road in London at that time.  The steam rising from the asphalt as cloth-capped workers lay the road surface ahead of the steamroller, and the whitish glow of milk bottles on a float, are eerie period essays in black and white, a paean to the dignity of labour."

"Suschitzky's father, Wilhelm, and mother, Adele (née Bauer), were secular Jews who owned a radical bookshop in Vienna.  Wilhelm, a noted free-thinker, killed himself during the rise of nazism.  Woflgang's elder sister, Edith (later Tudor-Hart), was also a photographer, and a great influence on her brother."

"Suschitsky left Vienna, and the Austrofascist regime that seized power in 1934, for Amsterdam, where he met and married Helena "Puck" Voûte, with whom he opened a photography studio.  By 1935 the marriage was ailing and he left for London.  There, he met film director Paul Rotha and they began to work together."

"Suschitsky was committed to photographing his adopted homeland and to helping others escape from his former one, including two cousins who, having been held at Dachau, were eventually released, only to be interned on the Isle of Man."

"Suschitsky believed that great photography is 'a combination of the right choice of detail, the elimination of all that is inessential and the right moment that makes the picture.'  He demystified his technique still further by adding, 'I was always quite content to be a good craftsman.'

– extracts from the 2016 obituary in the London Guardian

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Charing Cross Road
ca. 1936
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Sheep in Hyde Park, London
1937
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Near Monument Station, London
1938
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Victoria Bus Terminal
1939
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Hurlingham Club, London
1939
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Trafalgar Square
1942
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Hampstead Heath Fair
1949
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Easter Fair, Hampstead Heath
1964
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Fair on Streatham Common, London
1976
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

Wolfgang Suschitzky
Rupert Street Market, Soho, London
1980
gelatin silver print
Tate Gallery

The Mermaid !!!

George Cruikshank
The Mermaid !
Now Exhibiting at the Turf Coffee House
1822
hand-colored etching
British Museum

"A mummified creature poised erect on the curve of a fish's body, just above the tail, stands in a glass case, directed to the left.  The grotesque and hideous head of simian type is bent back and gazes upwards; arms, hands, shoulders, and pendent breasts are quasi-human, the body that of a fish of the salmon type with fins curiously arranged in pairs."

Issac Robert Cruikshank
The Mermaid (two views)
1822
etching
British Museum

"This object, bought by a sea-captain in Batavia for 5,000 dollars, was believed to be concocted of 'the blue faced monkey' and the prepared skin and fins of a salmon." The Times, 16 Nov. 1822

"It was the subject of an application to the Chancellor to prevent its removal, ownership being in dispute between the sea-captain and the owner of seven-eighths of his brig, which the former had sold, buying the creature with the proceeds."

– curator's notes from the British Museum

James Barry
The Angelic Guards
ca. 1802
etching
British Museum

"Angels seated at the edge of a cliff with clouds below to right and all around, the foremost with one foot on a rock, a key at his feet, holding his spear in both hands, others pointing outwards to right with spears.  Figures surrounding the angels include, in a row above them, left to right – Charles I, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Cassiodorus and another monk, Francis I and Agrippa; top row, left to right – Sir Joshua Reynolds, Giles Hussey, vestal and angel, Annibale Carracci, Domenichino, and an unidentified youth."

– curator's notes from the British Museum

Max Klinger
Secession (cover illustration)
 1893
etching, mezzotint
British Museum

Pietro Santi Bartoli
Tomb of Paolo Veronese (died 1588)
ca. 1650-1700
etching
British Museum

Giovanni Battista Mercati
Roundel with Roman Emperor hunting Bear
from a relief on the Arch of Constantine
 1642
etching dedicated to Francesco Borromini, Roman architect
British Museum

Giovanni Battista Mercati
Executioner presenting the Head of John the Baptist to Salome
1626
etching dedicated to Nicolao Alemanno, Prefect of the Vatican Library
British Museum

Giovanni Battista Mercati
St Bibiana refusing to sacrifice to pagan deities
1626
etching dedicated to Marcello Sacchetti, Roman art patron
British Museum

Giovanni Battista Mercati
Roundel with St Catherine of Alexandria seated in Glory
ca. 1620-40
etching
British Museum

Wenceslaus Hollar
View of Whitehall and Lambeth
1640s
etching
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Wenceslaus Hollar
Spring
1643
etching
Royal Collection, Windsor

Claude Mellan
Sheet of 20 portraits of Mercedarian martyrs
(religious order dedicated to ransoming Christian captives from the Moors)
ca. 1624-36
etching
British Museum

The individual portraits with names and dates of martyrdom have been cut out of a larger engraving and pasted individually onto a separate sheet. The originally engraving printed at Rome under the sponsorship of the Mercedarians contained double this number of portraits. The British Museum preserves copies of the others also, pasted onto a partner sheet.

Jean Mignon
Transformation of Actaeon
ca. 1540-50
etching
Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf

Battista Franco
Bacchantes with Apollo and Daphne
ca. 1530-61
etching
British Museum