The
History of the Theatre Poster
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With the invention of lithographic printing in 1851, theatre managers
realised that they could provide coloured illustrations to advertise
their productions. They also saw that detailed cast-lists were superfluous
on posters, and some managers began producing separate programmes to
give that information when patrons reached the theatre. As theatres gradually
moved from nightly changing programmes to ‘runs’ of plays,
so the production of both programmes and posters became more viable.
The earliest colour lithograph posters of the 1860s were small, but
they gradually increased in size. Towards the end of the century, the
influence of great French poster artists such as Jules Chèret
and Henri de Toulouse Lautrec was important too. By the 1890s, poster
design was regarded as an art, as well as an indispensable form of advertising.
People marvelled at the large, coloured pictures on the streets, and
commercial poster hoardings were introduced.
Blondin Poster
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This poster advertising the French tightrope walker Blondin, was remarkably bold for its time, featuring a large, woodcut image of the famous performer. By 1869 Blondin was a regular feature at the Crystal Palace. When the proposal to hire him had first been made in 1862, one of the directors was concerned about the bad publicity that an accident might provoke. ‘Suppose he was to fall?’ ‘Blondin, fall from a rope!’ replied Harry Coleman, his manager, ‘He can’t’. Blondin was offered a fee of £1,200, four times as much as the next highest paid performer. This specially adapted bicycle, or velociped was one of the props he invented to keep the act from becoming stale. In the 1960s, a hundred years after its invention, Blondin’s grandson found his grandfather’s velociped for sale in a London junk shop. Another prop used by Blondin, a wheelbarrow with a grooved wheel to keep it on the rope, is in the Theatre Museum's collections. Created: 1860s This object features in the
Circus
Guided Tour
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