1940s Original Swiss Art Deco Poster, Fly TWA: Switzerland - Baumberger

Switzerland/Fly Twa (1940) Poster art is one of Switzerland's major contributions to decorative arts. For more than a century, Swiss graphic designers gave a strong personality to their art by synthesizing very different influences and cultures. The colors and layout of this poster clearly indicate how far swiss poster art had evolved and changed - gone are the Art Nouveau flourishes and the straight lines of Art Deco: this joyous examination of country life is clearly bucolic and picturesque. Remember, 1940 was just after the beginning of WWII and this poster would be trying to convince global, but primarily American, passengers of the safety (rather than risk) involved in flying to Switzerland with TWA. About Baumberger it has been written- Otto Baumberger (1889 – 1961) was one of the first Swiss who can be correctly described as a poster designer, even though his personal desire for artistic recognition would remain unfulfilled. as an employee of the  Wolfensberger AG in Zürich he acquired a sound knowledge of lithography techniques, and used this knowledge to advance and renew the medium, designing over 200 posters. Baumberger was ahead of his time in recognizing 
important aspects of consumer advertising. without creating a style of his own, he sought the most appropriate way of conveying a message. His original, inventive images led to a reduction that reached towards abstraction, as image and lettering elements gradually formed an increasingly striking synthesis. The diversity of Baumberger’s work exemplarily embodies the history of Swiss poster art in the first half of the twentieth century, showing the development from the painterly artist’s poster to incorporate design shaped by graphic art.