Alexandre de Riquer, Painting and Posters and More

Alexandre de Riquer i Ynglada, 7th Count of Casa Dávalos (1856-1920) is probably best known for his poster work.  But he also painted, engraved, and wrote poetry and other works.  Some background inforation is here, but from there you can link to his Catalan language Wikipedia page for greater detail.

Although Riquer was a Count, like many other late-1800s nobility he was not a rich one, so had to earn his living.  Moreover, his art training was not done in a fancy city such as Paris or even his home town of Barcelona.  Instead he went to Béziers, France.

Since he was talented, it didn't really matter where he got his art training.  Like most of us, he learned on the job.  And via travel to Italy, England and elsewhere.

The examples below are mostly of posters, because they were the internet items that most caught my eye.

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Ritratto di mujer
I have no information about this, and the image is blotchy, yet interesting.

Nymph in the Moonlight

Four Seasons, Spring - 1899
The seasons were a popular topic for poster artists of the day.

Four Seasons, Summer - 1899

Four Seasons, Autumn - 1899

Four Seasons, Winter - 1899

Figura feminina amb un vas - 1887
Influenced by English Pre-Raphaelites and Arts & Crafts.

Industrial and Fine Arts Barcelona Exhibit - 1896

Salon Pedal - 1897
Bicycles were all the rage in the late 1800s.

Antigua Casa Franch - 1899

Mosaicos Escofet-Tejera y Ca. - 1900

More Fred Taylor Poster Art

I wrote here about Fred Taylor (1875-1963), best known for his London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) poster art during the 1920s and 1930s.

His work was almost always pleasing, so below are more examples for your viewing pleasure.

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The illustration part of a larger poster.

Showing Queen Elizabeth I's 1564 visit to King's College Chapel, Cambridge. I was there once for Evensong, and it strikes me that the height of the interior seems a bit exaggerated in part because the size of the people seems too small.

Moderne architecture required similarly simplified treatment.

Seen from the far side of the Neckar River.

An unusual view, and not what a 1920s tourist would ever see.

A 1930s vintage poster when Taylor and other illustrators simplified their styles to conform to artistic fashion.

A little fuzzy because the original was slightly smaller. Nevertheless, a nicely done scene.

Poster: Stadtbahnstation Karlsplatz, Vienna

Otto Koloman Wagner (1841-1918) was one of the first architects to move away from Classicism towards Modernism. His mature style was something of a geometrical version of the Art Nouveau style or Jugendstil, as it was known in German speaking countries. A brief biography is here.

One of his noteworthy creations was the 1899 Karlsplatz Stadtbahn Station in Vienna -- the Stadtbahn being the municipal railway system.

Ten years or so ago when I was visiting Vienna, I noticed a poster dealing with the Karlsplatz station building in a display window. I continued walking for a short distance, but then turned back to the shop because I felt I had to have that poster (and I almost never buy posters).

I know nothing about the poster's origin. It incorporates elements of architectural presentations, but might possibly be a presentation in itself created by Wagner's firm.

Here it is: click on the images to enlarge.

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A slightly cropped photo I took of my poster.

I find these women charmingly depicted. Whoever drew them knew what he was doing artistically.  When I was taking first-year architectural design, most renderings on display showed people as blobs with legs.

Harrogate Travel Posters from the LNER

During the 1920s and 1930s Britain had four major privately owned passenger railway systems that operated on a largely regional basis. That is, each had a core area that it essentially dominated, but also had tendrils that were in areas of others. So there was some direct competition, but that was generally minor aside from, for instance, the London Midland & Scottish Railway and the London and North Eastern Railway (the LNER) both serving Leeds, Glasgow and Edinburgh.

Besides the relatively minor case of overlapping destinations, the greatest competition seems to have involved attracting tourists and vacationers to places within core service areas. For example, the Great Western Railway would publicize Cornwall while the LNER would be touting Scarborough, leaving potential travelers to mull over which site to select.

To keep advertising fresh from season to season and year to year, railroad companies often used different poster designers over time instead of sticking to one artist doing multiple works for the same destination (though that was done too). This rotation was the policy of LNER.

As an example of this, below are LNER posters for the spa city of Harrogate in Yorkshire, not far west of York.

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By Frank Brangwyn.

By Lilian Hocknell.

By Austin Cooper.

By Arthur C. Michael.

By Fred Taylor.

By Joseph Greenup.

By Tom Purvis.

By Frank Newbould.

Fred Taylor: Poster Art for the LNER and Others

Fred Taylor (1875-1963) was one of the many talented artists who created art for British railway company travel posters.

Biographical information on him is truly sketchy. A National Railway Museum publication in my library has the following:

"Born in London, he studied at Goldsmith's College and worked at the Waring and Gillow Studio. In 1930 he was commissioned to design four ceiling paintings for the Underwriting Room at Lloyd's and murals for Reed's Lacquer Room. He worked in naval camouflage during the Second World War. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and other galleries in London, and worked for the Empire Marketing Board, LNER, London Transport and several shopping companies."

And that's all I could find. The above blurb essentially deals with what he did starting at age 55.

The images below are of some of the poster art he did for the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) along with a few others in the 1920s and 1930s. Some of his 1930s work for LNER is similar in style to that of Tom Purvis, a more critically acclaimed poster artist who I wrote about here. Most of his poster illustrations are made in more traditional styles. Regardless, they are skillfully done. They were also popular with the general public, if the criterion is sales of posters. Moreover, Taylor was the best-paid LNER poster artist.

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Judging by the costumes, this was probably done in the early-to-mid 1920s.

Even though I've sailed from there, I had't realized that once upon a time Harwich was a port for steamships going to Belgium, Germany, etc. Note some items projecting beyond the frame at the left.

A Tom Purvis style poster. Perhaps the LNER at the time was interested in consistent images.

Petergate, in York: Minster in the background.

Historical scene: Captain Cook's departure in 1776.

Two railroads cited here, so I'm not sure who commissioned this.

It seems Taylor also did some work for the GWR.

Subtle color scheme for a travel poster, but nice.

A city close to York, and well worth a short visit.

Evocative Piccadilly Circus illustration. This was done in 1925.

Austin Cooper: Posters to Abstraction

Austin Cooper (1890-1964) was a Canadian-born British poster artist who, before he died, must have discovered that an automobile (the Austin Mini Cooper) was his namesake. Kidding aside, Cooper was one of a group of illustrators who created travel posters using a similar technique for the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER), especially during the 1930s.

His Wikipedia entry mentions that he moved across the Atlantic a few times but finally settled in England following his service in the Canadian army in the Great War. Besides creating posters, he managed a school of commercial art in the late 1930s, then abandoned illustration in the mid-1940s to pursue fine arts. Some of his abstract paintings are in the Tate collection.

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It's not clear to me what this poster was promoting, though the smokestacks are painted Canadian Pacific colors.

One of a series with the same theme and style.

Probably from the late 1920s.

He did a few posters for Indian Railways.

For a 1931 exhibit at the V&A.

This, from 1932.

This is a highly unusual style for a LNER poster. It was done around the mid-1930s, judging by the woman's clothing.

Abstraction 200/62 - 1957-1962