The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1893-02-11
PRINTERS WHO LEAD.
The American Poster Is Admired and
Bought Abroad as 1t Is Here.


The American poster has utterly changed
Its standing since the printers have been
producing their work by lithography. 1t
has become an Artistic creation. Wood
cuts may he as fine and as delicate as
etchings, but in poster they depended on
their cOarseness.
They needed TO be bold and conspicuous.
and the printing OF them required such
great amount of ink that any fine work that
might have been done upon them would
have clogged MP and become a great blot
The old-faShiOne poster picture was
always a wood cnt. and was always coarse
and rude.
With the advent OF TYPOGRAPHY into the
business, MT only artistic drawing but
brilliant color effects became possible. The
Americans found few artists here VINO
were accustomed TO the work. There were
famous painters who were mastery in
their use OF cOlOrS. but 1t was not possible
10 employ them IN calling that had not
then attracted wide attention, and that in
all probability never will rank as nearer
than c0usinship TO high art
Moreover, photography Is science by it
self 1t does not permit the execution of
the design that is aimed at 1t requires the
artist to reach an effect indirectly by draw
ing a picture as a l0oking-glass reflects a
figure, With the right side Of the stone max
ing the left side Of the finished work. The
best artists who have mastered this trick
are the cartoOnists upon the leading weekly
papers that produce pictures in c0lors.
The number of men who were competent
to produce the American poster of today
was very small when the printers took up
photography. EurOpe, however, was a rich
treasury of clever drAughtSmen and color
lists who were trained to photographic work.
To Europe the American pOsteT-printers
went for their talent, and the consequence
has bppD today loading ri r. in
this country are nearly all Europeans.
They are Frenchmen, Germans and Rus
SLAMS.
They lave been imported in this country
as fast as they have attracted attention In
their own capitals ana the custom Of re-
cruiting their ranks with men of their own
nationalities still goes on. The American
poster Is, therefore, In one sense foreign
product. The artists, the process, the litbo-
graphic stOnes-allare brought from abroad.
Even some Of the paper in use on the dead
walls Of the country. though made here, is
manufactured of fiber that is imported.
But the finished product of this
foreign combination Is as truly Amerl-
can as the enterprise and judgment
that led up 10 II. So American IS
our noster. in fact. that to-day the most at
tIactve fence and wall advertising done in
London. Paris, Madrid and Berlin is printed
in Cincinnati and New York. 1t is not
merely the Barnum circus, the kiralfy
spectacle or the series of Yankee patent
medicines that are thus eXtOlled abroad.
The Europeans themselves send here
TO get their posters. 1t IS a Curl
GUS circumstance that the same artist
who in Paris turned out an artistic but old
fashioned, unattractive little placard now
sends from America 10 the same Paris firm
the stunning, SNOWY, beautiful designs that
are everywhere class fed as American.
There are no secrets in the making Of the
new-style poster, except that the biggest,
most successful printers are those that en-
pl0y the best talent, show the most enter
prise ana spend the most money for the best
materials and machinery. They give out
the figure work to the figure men, the letter
ing to the best designers, the color work to
the men whose skill as colOrists has at
tracted wide attention. They pay good
wages. There are poster artists who are
getting $4,000 year, OT perhaps more than
any painter or illustrator on any magazine
or in any studio In this city.