L’affiche, paroles publiques

Diego Zaccaria, the director of cultural affairs at Echirolles, gives us a history of the modern and contemporary poster. He knows what he is talking about: he is the one who created in 1990 in this municipality on the outskirts of Grenoble the Month of graphism, an event that has triggered off copies throughout Europe. The itinerary starts with calls to the mobilisation of World War I(the famous Uncle Sam with a finger pointed «I need you for the US Army»). He then experienced some unique moments: the Surrealist inventiveness of the polish school, Malcolm Glaser’s purified graphism, the Dutch exaggerations of Anthony Beeke (a poster for Kleist’s play Penthésilée with a penis in erection), Mario Cresci’s and Massimo Dolcini’s Italian elegance, the latter having had the luck of working over the long term (twenty years) for the daring municipality of Pesaro, that communicated over «author’s posters». We can well recall the discussion that accompanied in 2002 Amen, Costa-Gavras’s , movie with a Christian cross that changed into a swastika: the degree of tolerance of corporations changes in space and in time, and posters are one of the most sensitive indicators.

• L’affiche, paroles publiques(Posters as public words) by Diego Zaccaria, Textuel, 2008, 256 p., 49 €, ISBN : 978-2-84597-294-0.

• Not to be missed: the Month of graphism at Echirolles, held until 31 January 2009.