Barcelona’s Museu de Disseny opens a new exhibition on 14 December entitled ‘The advertising boom. Tin, cardboard and tile posters 1890-1950’, featuring over 250 exhibits, many of them produced in Catalonia.
The show has been created as a journey through the development of this genre of graphic commercial publicity, which saw everyday objects embellished with advertising for a range of products that were also part of daily life at the time – these included pharmaceuticals, food, alcoholic drinks and tobacco.
It was a move away from the use of posters that had previously been standard, and the change meant that advertising started to appear in new locations such as shops, windows and façades.
Life-size cardboard figures were created to advertise certain goods and these ended up becoming iconic characters at the time, while the boom also made the most of new techniques that enabled the use of colour in adverts.
The Design Museum of Barcelona opened at its present location, the Disseny Hub, in 2014 and brought together the collections of three existing museums, those covering decorative arts, textiles, and graphic arts, which now make up the permanent exhibitions of the centre.
When: 14 December to 31 March
Where: Museu del Disseny de Barcelona, Plaça de les Glòries Catalanes, 37-38
More info: ajuntament.barcelona.cat