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Estimate: $ 700 - $ 1,000
JEAN CARLU (1900-1997) AMERICA OPEN YOUR EYES! 1941. 14x10 7/8 inches. Condition A. This small poster was commissioned for Fortune magazine by the periodical's art director, Francis Brenan. It appeared in the August, 1941 issue of the magazine, along with other posters by Binder, Bayer, Steichen and Giusti. The issue was all on a single subject, World War II, and Brenan hoped to set an example of how sophisticated design could still be efficient. Carlu who, as a Frenchman, was totally aware of the Nazi threat, takes a brave approach to alert American captains of industry and business leaders of the fascist threat. Literally blinded by "business as usual," which could have meant any commercial dealings with Germany, Carlu exorts American business to "open your eyes" to the growing threat of nazism, which he simply depicts as a swastika amidst dark, swirling clouds. Printing on the back explains the purpose of the poster series: "Preeminently America is an industrial nation and America's preeminent function in the war is as an arsenal of democracy. Yet America's capacity to produce is no stronger than the will of the men who work her mines and factories. What labor must realize is that in total war every citizen, whether in or out of uniform, is a combatant; that in the total kind of war the U.S. is fighting, a war of production labor's role is even more crucial than that of the armed forces." Carlu 52.
