Focus on Collection - Going Underground The London Transport Museum Poster Collection

Focus on Collection

Going Underground

The London Transport Museum Poster Collection

by David Bownes

Twentieth Century Posters and former Head Curator, LTM London, UK

London Transport Museum holds one of the world’s greatest, and most complete, poster collections. Over 5,500 different designs trace the story of the Capital’s Underground, bus and tram network from the 1860s to the present day.

With few exceptions, multiple copies of each poster were retained from about 1908 and are now kept at the museum’s purpose-built store in Acton, West London. But the resulting collection is far more than an institutional archive of urban transit. Thanks to a progressive and pioneering approach to publicity, London Transport achieved international acclaim for the vitality and modernism of its poster programme – a tradition that continues today. Collectively, these posters provide a comprehensive record of British poster design in the twentieth century and beyond.

The origins of this remarkable collection can be traced to Frank Pick, a Lincolnshire railwaywan who became Traffic Manager of the ‘Underground Group’ in 1906. Lacking any formal training in advertising, Pick nonetheless grasped that existing publicity was uninspired and conservative, often the work of jobbing artists rather than specialists.

By his own admission, Pick’s first attempts at publicity lacked a clear strategy other than to produce attractive, well-laid out, advertising promoting wider use of services outside peak hours. To do this, he commissioned established commercial artists, such as the ‘poster king’ John Hassall, as well as emerging designers to create a range of poster styles with broad appeal. Inspired, too, by the egalitarian philosophy of the Arts & Crafts movement, Pick was unusual among British advertisers in employing popular female illustrators, like Mabel Lucie Attwell, to lead campaigns.

Soon Pick’s modern, colourful, posters were attracting considerable interest from the press and travelling public alike. In response to demand, the Underground began to sell duplicate copies and arranged poster exhibitions in London galleries from 1917. By now, a clear Underground poster style was beginning to emerge, dubbed ‘Tubist’ in the press and best reflected in the bold, flat-colour, work of Gregory Brown and the American-born Edward McKnight Kauffer – both of whom got their ‘big break’ with Pick. Of these, Kauffer was to become the most influential, but there were many others who helped

transform the Tube into “London’s longest art gallery”, including Austin Cooper, Anna Zinkeisen, Rosemary & Clifford Ellis, Paul Nash, Edward Bawden, and Graham Sutherland. Their ranks were swollen in the 1930s by the arrival of progressive European-based designers fleeing Nazi oppression, who found a receptive commissioner in the Underground. In this way, the works of Man Ray, Laszlo Maholy Nagy, Julius Klinger and others were first seen in London on the Tube than in a gallery.

John Hassall , No need to ask a p’liceman!, 1908

This was one of first graphic posters commissioned by Frank Pick. At the time, passengers were still unsure how to use the Tube. The message reassures travellers that the system is easy to navigate, with frequent and fast trains.

In the meantime, Pick had risen to become the manging director of London Transport (as the Underground was called from 1933) and forged a reputation for overseeing the highest standards of publicity and presentation. Under his leadership, the Underground commissioned its own unique typeface from Edward Johnston (still used today in a modified form), developed a distinctive ‘bullseye’ logo and employed leading architects to bring a visual unity to the company’s vast transport empire. Incredibly, given the range of his responsibilities, Pick continued to take a personal interest in the quality of the Underground’s printed publicity and chaired the fortnightly Publicity Department meetings to ensure that all submissions met his exacting standards. He also found time to advise other organisations and exerted a profound influence on the development of modern publicity in Britain.

“By now, a clear Underground poster style was beginning to emerge...”

Mabel Lucie Attwell , Hullo! Did you come by Underground?, 1913

Early Underground posters were often repurposed for other publicity uses, such as postcards and leaflets.

Edward McKnight Kauffer, Power, 1931

Probably the greatest poster designer to work in Britain during the C20th, Kauffer received his very first commission from Frank Pick and London Underground. Power is widely considered to be one of his greatest works and shows the influence of contemporary art movements.

F Gregory Brown, Hatfield, 1916

Brown was regarded as one of the foremost British poster artists of his age, famed for the bold use of flat (and often unreal) colourisation.

Austin Cooper, Posters at the Victoria and Albert Museum, 1931

Frank Pick played an important part in establishing the poster collection at the Victoria & Albert Museum and in raising the profile of poster art generally. The latest London Underground designs were regularly sent to galleries for display and exhibition.

Clifford and Rosemary Ellis, It is better to return early, 1935

Pick commissioned a broad range of poster styles to suit all tastes. This superb modernist design, with its unusual representation of a crowded Tube carriage, is typical of the more daring approach taken by the Underground even when conveying mundane messages, such as encouraging off-peak travel.

Man Ray, London Transport keeps London going, 1938

By the late 1930s day-to-day commissioning was largely undertaken by Pick’s deputy, Christian Barman. An avowed modernist, Barman was instrumental in attracting avant-garde talent to the Underground hoardings, such as the American Man Ray.

László Moholy-Nagy, Your fare from this station, 1936

Barman was probably also responsible for commissioning the Hungarian artist and Bauhaus professor Molohy-Nagy for a series of information posters in the mid-1930s. Pick, who’s personal tastes were more conservative, was unimpressed, later dismissing Molohy-Nagy as a ‘surrealist pasticheur’.

Frank Pick (1878-1941)

The architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner regarded Pick as ‘a modern Medici’ for his outstanding patronage of the very best public art, architecture and design. He wrote that under Pick’s leadership, London Transport became a powerhouse of ‘civilised urbanity and humane common sense... the most efficacious centre of visual education in England’.

Tom Eckersley and Eric Lombers, By bus to the pictures tonight, 1935

Eckersley was another young designer who got his ‘big break’ via Frank Pick, before rising to greater acclaim. His first poster, designed with fellow Salford Art College graduate Eric Lombers, shows he influence of the Bauhaus and Dutch De Stijl movement and would have been regarded as very progressive at the time.

Pick’s legacy continued long after he left the Underground in 1940. Successive publicity officers developed the poster programme by commissioning outstanding designers in the post-war era, most notably FHK Henrion, Tom Eckersley and Abram Games. Requests for surplus posters continued too, with London Transport establishing retail outlets to meet demand, firstly at 55 Broadway and now via London Transport Museum shop.

Gillian Ayres, Oranges and lemons, 1992

This poster was one of several commissioned from fine artists during the 1980s and 1990s as part of the Platform for Art programme.

Hans Schleger, Thanks to the Underground, 1935

During the 1930s the Underground benefited from the talents of several prominent emigre artists fleeing Nazi oppression. Schleger was part of this group that bought a new, continental, aesthetic to Tube posters.

Henri Kay Henrion, Visitor’s London, 1956

Like Schleger, Henrion had relocated to London to escape persecution on the continent and quickly established a reputation for the quality of his wartime work for the British government. By the mid-50s Henrion was well established as a leading graphic designer and teacher.

Abram Games, Zoo, 1976

Games received his first commission from the Underground in the 1930s and went on to become one of the company’s, and the country’s, most prolific and admired designers.

Esther Cox, London’s riverside, 2017

A recent graduate, Cox’s bold flat colour posters for Transport for London reflect the best traditions of the Underground’s commissioning policy.

To find out more about LTM’s amazing poster collection, visit the museum in Covent Garden or view the entire collection online at https://www.ltmuseum.co.uk/ collections/collections-online/posters. Regular tours of the poster collection are held at Acton Depot, and a huge amount has been written on the subject. A full biobibliography can be viewed here: https://www. twentiethcenturyposters.com/pages/bibliography