May 06, 2002 - Sale 1935

Sale 1935 - Lot 102

Unsold
Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 1,500
JOSEPH MULLER-BROCKMANN (1914-1996) UBERHOLEN ? IM ZWEIFEL NIE! 1957.
50 1/4x35 1/4 inches.
Condition A-: minor tears in margins. Paper.
The undisputed leader of the Zurich post war graphic school, Muller-Brockmann, who was a designer, typographer, teacher and author, created two historically important poster series: endless typographic and abstract variations for Musica Viva (a yearly music festival in Basel) and the series for the Swiss Automobile Club. For five years, after winning a competition in 1953, he produced posters and brochures for the Automobile Club using photomontage, creating the some of the strongest images ever for the protection of the individual motorist. Having already experimented with "subjective photography", he moved to "objective photography", this piece being a perfect example. The poster is divided vertically into three spaces: a black mass of car on the right, seen from behind, another on the left coming towards us, and a motorcycle in the middle. The image is separated by contrasting horizontal lines composed of the yellow strip of road and the white paper; the dramatic power of the image needs only two lines of text at the top.
ref: Joseph Muller-Brockmann, Pioneer of Swiss Graphic Design<>, Verlag Lars Muller Baden-Switzerland 1995, p. 47.