?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 7,000 - $ 10,000
LEONETTO CAPPIELLO (1875-1942) CINZANO. 1910. 55x38 1/2 inches, 140x98 cm. Lit. del Cinzano, Torino. Condition B+ / B: restored losses in margins; creases and abrasions in margins and image; restoration along sharp vertical and horizontal folds. Cappiello was the most influential poster artist of the first quarter of the 20th century, and also the most prolific. He began his career as a caricaturist for Parisian magazines, a style that is reflected in his earliest posters. His 1903 poster for Chocolat Klaus was a benchmark image for the artist, and revolutionary for his career and the world of outdoor advertising in general. With this poster he invented a new approach to poster design that featured brightly colored animals or characters that stuck in the public's mind so forcibly that they became icons for the brand. Following his own example he came up with a man riding bareback on a red zebra with a bottle of Cinzano vermouth in his hand. "What the red horse did for Chocolat Klaus . . . the [red] zebra did for Cinzano" (Rennert / Cappiello p. 118). Printed in Italy under the auspices of Vercasson in Paris, there are three variants of this poster. This is considered to be the first printing. Rennert / Cappiello 153 (var), Wine Spectator 178 (var), Manifesti Italiani p. 54 (var).
