Memories of the dark - Advertising Posters

Paolo Forti

Advertising Posters

In the early twentieth century, the tourism sector started to expand rapidly, although it would still be some time before it would become a mass industry. Private vehicles were still thin on the ground and, as such, the railways – which had been developed very extensively in the late nineteenth century – played a crucial role in allowing tourists to reach the destinations they wanted to visit. At the beginning of the twentieth century – thanks in part to the parallel development of billboards, which were often created by famous painters – the state railways in many countries produced posters of the main caves that tourists could reach by train. Today, these floral- or Deco-style posters are much sought-after, achieving eye-watering prices at international auctions. Fortunately, the “Franco Anelli” Centre for Speleological Documentation has a substantial collection of them, including this poster advertising the Han and Rochefort caves in Belgium.

LA VENTA Members

Roberto Abiuso Paolo Agnelli Giorgio Annichini Daniela Barbieri Teresa Bellagamba Alvise Belotti Alessandro Beltrame Tullio Bernabei Gaetano Boldrini Alfredo Brunetti Leonardo Colavita Carla Corongiu Tiziano Conte Vittorio Crobu Norma Damiano Riccardo De Luca Ada De Matteo Antonio (Tono) De Vivo Jo De Waele Umberto Del Vecchio Sara Di Ferrante Davide Domenici Paolo Forti Luca Gandolfo Enrico Giacomin Giuseppe Giovine Luca Imperio Felice La Rocca Massimo Liverani Francesco (Ciccio) Lo Mastro Luca Massa Marco Mecchia Paolo Petrignani Leonardo Piccini Riccardo Pozzobon Enzo Procopio Alberto Righetto Alessio Romeo Giovanni Rossi Patrizio Rubcich Natalino Russo Tommaso Santagata Francesco Sauro Giuseppe Savino Francesco Spinelli Roberto Trevi Stefano Vanni Marco Vattano

Foreign proponents

Josè Maria Calaforra Alicia Davila Fulvio Eccardi Esteban Gonzalez Elizabeth Gutiérrez F. Israel Huerta Carlos Lazcano Enrique Lipps Jesus Lira Mauricio Náfate L. Jorge Paz T. Monica Ponce Argelia Tiburcio Freddy Vergara, Kaleb Zárate Galvez

Honorary Members

Raul Arias Giuseppe Casagrande Viviano Domenici Adolfo Eraso Romero Elvio Gaido Amalia Gianolio Italo Giulivo Silvia Nora Menghi Luca Mercalli Ernesto Piana Rosanna Rabajoli Tim Stratford Marco Topani Carina Vandenberghe

In memory

Giovanni Badino † Paolino Cometti † Francesco Dal Cin † Edmund Hillary † Adrian G. Hutton † Lucas Ruiz † Thomas Lee Whiting †