I have been looking for some propaganda posters since I arrived. You can find everything with Chairman Mao's face here but my luck with posters has been a little less than lucky -until I saw these in Old Shanghai.
I've always been fascinated with Cult Personalities, whether it was with Hitler, Stalin, Mao, or even now with Obama. It's still truly amazes me to see a society completely envelope it's ideals, hopes, and aspirations into one god-like being. Many of whom 'worship' them in a manner that is almost on a religious level. During the peak of these regimes, these leaders are presented as almost infallible. Their portraits hung in homes and public buildings, and often with artists and poets legally required to produce only works that glorified them.
Chairman Mao (Mao Zedong), despite his many faults and now ill-repute, is still one of those god-like, infallible creatures here in China. My kids still wear pins with his face on them, my co-workers at school still have Mao charms hanging from their rear-view mirror, and everyone still praises his legacy.
Anyways, I was glad to have found these. They definitely aren't originals (although sold as...) but I will still treasure them as cultural artefacts nonetheless.
From a design perspective I think they are genius. I love the two-tone, simple graphics with minimal use of text. I love the line work and blocks of colour (good use of positive and negative space!) and they truly do reflect the current ideologies of the era, which can only appreciate with time.
for more info on these posters and many others: http://www.iisg.nl/landsberger/
xox
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