AUGUSTE VIOLLIER (1845-1908) APPENZELL / SUISSE. 1904. 44x32 1/2 inches, 112x82 cm. Walter Marty, Herisau. Condition B+ / B: sharp vertical and horizontal folds; repaired tears and restoration in margins and image. In 1898, Switzerland's five large private railroad companies were nationalized, to form the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB in German, CFF in French and FFS in Italian). In 1903, the new company held a poster contest, open only to Swiss artists, asking for a landscape with no requirements for the appearance of trains, bridges or even overt commercial advertising. Viollier, who under the pseudonym Godefroy had already designed a number of posters, was one of the four winners. The winning posters were "realized by painters who express their work through the attachment with their homeland, of which they want to show the essence. The spirit of these posters is completely different from that of previous ones. They celebrate their country through dense, colored, expressive images" (Paradis p. 122). This is the French version. Paradis p. 122.
