Product Description

A wide selection of the most eye-catching and iconic examples from the Imperial War Museum's internationally renowned poster collection.

Published to accompany an exhibition at London's Imperial War Museum, this book features more than 250 superb full-color illustrations of hard-hitting propaganda and groundbreaking graphic art. It encompasses iconic images such as Alfred Leete's "Your Country Needs You" as well as additional material drawn from the world of advertising and documentary photographs of posters in situ.

Through posters, the author examines the social, political, ethnic, and cultural aspirations of America, Britain, Ireland, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Belgium, Russia, Austria, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. Covering topics as diverse as advertising in World War I, the Bolshevik Revolution, the Spanish Civil War, Germany and Occupied Europe in World War II, anti-nuclear campaigns, and Vietnam, the book is comprehensive and highly analytical, yet accessible. 300 illustrations, 250 in color.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #101108 in Books
• Published on: 2007-11-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 256 pages

About the Author
James Aulich has organized a large international collaborative project: Posters in Eastern and Central Europe (PEACE). He has written several books on the history of posters and war in Europe and Vietnam.

Customer Reviews

A useful coffee table book on propaganda - not your normal center piece
This book is a formidable weight! It can be used as a 'coffee table book' but it is more than that. The illustrations are brilliant and the explanatory text very interesting. If you have an interest in propaganda, you should love it. I was given it as a present but I would have bought it anyway if I had spotted it first. It is unusual and brilliant.

Graphics of the Highest Caliber
It's not surprising to learn that this handsome volume was printed in conjunction with a British museum exhibit of war posters. The graphics chosen for inclusion here are of the highest caliber, and I can only imagine that curators pored over each of these and culled dozens (hundreds, even!) of others.

It's fascinating to compare the icons, color schemes, and appeals to patriotism that have accompanied modern warfare in its various arenas. The posters are worth lingering over and thinking about, and the international flavor of the selections is laudable.

I might quibble that the final chapter of anti-war posters seems vastly less impressive than it could have been; perhaps the author felt that it needed to be included, but didn't have the page count to accommodate the topic? No matter. A brilliant book; highly recommended.

History is written by the victor.....
This book is very interesting because it shows posters made for war propaganda from both sides of the conflict. The posters give the reader a glimpse of how the other side viewed itself and its enemy.

I am totally against fascist regime in Nazi Germany, Italy, and Imperial Japan, but to see their war posters, I sensed they really believed that they were fighting against a greater evil. The question is, what if we lost? Would we be portrayed as the evil capitalist empire on a mission to exploit the entire world?