From the Pic­ture Library

’The Men Are Ready…’ by the Pub­lic Inform­a­tion (cre­at­ing agency) in the early 1940s. Mater­i­als: print­ing ink, paper. Dimen­sions: 750 x 510mm. Tech­nique: off­set lithography.

World War II Posters.

A few years ago Te Papa Tongarewa ran an exhib­i­tion on posters from World War II entitled "Duty Calls". The Te Papa Pic­ture Lib­rary recently gave us per­mis­sion to repro­duce a few of these posters online. Much of this col­lec­tion was amassed, dis­trib­uted and dis­played by Wel­ling­ton man­u­fac­tur­ing busi­ness­man Cecil Her­bert Andrews as part of his war effort, and later donated to the Domin­ion Museum in 1967. From a graphic per­spect­ive it's inter­est­ing to note the pro­pa­ganda style – the strong use of col­our and imagery, strik­ing con­trasts and simple, emo­tion­ally loaded mes­sages. There's a power­ful plea here to get behind the war effort. Some of these posters were designed by the best New Zea­l­and com­mer­cial design­ers at the time and painted with great care, some were designed and prin­ted in the UK.

By way of fur­ther explan­a­tion, here's some addi­tional inform­a­tion from the exhib­i­tion cur­ator at the time: "New Zealand’s war posters echoed thou­sands of oth­ers by artists around the world. As a pro­pa­ganda tool they were cheap and easy to make, they gave wide cov­er­age and were eas­ily replaced as the war’s unfold­ing events changed gov­ern­ment pri­or­it­ies. They urged people to join the armed forces, volun­teer, lend money, and work harder and faster. As an art form and a means of com­mu­nic­a­tion, the poster is still one of the most effect­ive ways to get a mes­sage across to a busy pub­lic. You pass hun­dreds every week on city streets."

Addi­tional image notes from Te papa's cur­at­ors below. Fur­ther images of this type can be found here.
- Michael Barrett

Art­work for poster, ’Speed Up Pro­duc­tion’ by Mar­cus King, a com­mer­cial artist based in Wel­ling­ton circa 1942 — 1943. Mater­i­als: gou­ache, graph­ite, paper.

Speed Up Pro­duc­tion – "Painted with great care and detail, King has designed a power­ful and emo­tional plea to the older gen­er­a­tion. The image shows a respect­able cit­izen in shirt and tie covered in over­alls com­ing out of retire­ment to 'muck-in'. King deep­ens the two dimen­sional space of the poster by hav­ing the cit­izen ges­ture over his shoulder to an evoc­at­ive war­time scene in the dis­tant back­ground. The link­ing of mas­culin­ity to the machinery of heavy industry is a com­mon device in war posters through­out the world. Mar­cus King was a respec­ted graphic artist in the 1930s and 1940s, work­ing for vari­ous gov­ern­ment agen­cies includ­ing the Post Office."

’He Offers His Life’ by C. M. Banks Ltd print­ing firm in June 1943. Three col­our block-printed text over a col­our line block pro­cess image (photomechanical).

He Offers His Life… – "A fund-raising poster designed and prin­ted in World War II. The poster is an emo­tion­ally charged call for New Zeal­anders to give money to the war effort. Its inten­tion is to remind civil­ians of the sac­ri­fices that were being made on their behalf by armed forces over­seas. This par­tic­u­lar mes­sage is achieved through guilt and a noble image of a pilot — 'He Offers His Life!' After 1940, the National Sav­ings Com­mit­tee raised sub­stan­tial annual internal loans based on vol­un­tary pub­lic sub­scrip­tion to pay for the war. Many New Zeal­anders lent their money to the gov­ern­ment, to be repaid after the war at mod­est interest rates. Most of the loans were called 'Liberty Loans' (this par­tic­u­lar poster advert­ised the '3rd Liberty Loan' of 1943). Nearly half of the country's war spend­ing was covered by internal bor­row­ing. New Zea­l­and had no out­stand­ing over­seas debt as a res­ult of World War II. Posters such as this made intense appeals, often through guilt, to New Zeal­anders' sense of pat­ri­ot­ism and sacrifice."

’You are help­ing by cyc­ling when you can’ by the Henry Hildes­ley Ltd print­ing firm in the early 1940s. Dimen­sions: 508 x 387mm.

Loose Lips Sink Ships – an example of a typ­ical World War II poster found in New Zea­l­and at the time.

'That kind of talk sinks ships' by Grey­caine Ltd. print­ing firm in 1941. Tech­nique: off­set lithography.

'Knit for the Navy' by Fosh & Cross Ltd a print­ing firm based in Lon­don in the early 1940s. Off­set litho­graph on paper.

Poster mont­age: ’Wanted Scrap Metal / We Want Rags / Save Waste Paper / Save Waste Bones’, pub­lished by Pub­lic Inform­a­tion in the early 1940s.

Share/Save