Changes have been both progressive and spontaneous.    Progressive as man's appreciation and understanding of new technology has improved and spontaneous as new art forms have developed.

Of all the changes which have occurred there are several instances which predominate and the effect of which was most profound.   It is these "milestones" which we now examine briefly.    Please use our Search Engine to find examples of all the works we refer to below.

Lithography was invented in 1801 by Aloys Senefelder but at first it was too slow and expensive for use in poster production.    At that time posters were made from wood block or metal engravings with very little color or design.

This all changed around 1860 when Jules Chéret introduced color to lithography with his "three stone lithographic process".    This breakthrough allowed artists to achieve true color in posters as they did in their paintings.    Although the process was difficult it was nevertheless mastered to a degree which produced posters with a remarkable intensity of texture and color previously impossible.

This, then, was the true beginning of the modern poster industry.

This developed of its own accord until the 1890s when the poster craze came into full bloom in an era known as the "Belle Époque" when posters were elevated to a "fine-art" status.

Started in 1891 by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec with his renowned "Moulin Rouge" poster other artists were quick to follow and very soon Poster Exhibitions, Magazines and Dealers were in abundance, both in the capitals of Europe and throughout America.   By the mid 1890s poster art had developed into a form known as "Art Nouveau", characterized by organic lines and complex symbolism, combining decorative art with usefulness.

The first notable example of "Art Nouveau" was created in 1894 by Alphonse Mucha in his masterpiece poster produced for Sarah Bernhardt and quick to follow were Grasset, Moser and others.

"Art Nouveau" was to be the dominant poster style right up to the commencement of World War 1.

About the same time artists from the UK, Austria and Germany were adopting this "modernistic" approach to their work, a classic example of which can be found in a poster submitted by Lucien Bernhard for a competition organized by Preister Matches.   His simple design of 2 large matches supported by the Brand Name was universally  acclaimed.

The advent of War brought a new role for the poster, one which was to have an everlasting effect, Propaganda.   Posters were used extensively during the war years, both 1st and 2nd World Wars and afterward for recruitment, fund-raising and in creating anti-enemy propaganda.    

Soon after World War I ended poster evolution entered another phase of change with the introduction of Cubism, Futurism, Dada and Expressionism.    Shapes were simplified and streamlined and curved letterforms were replaced by sleek, angular ones.

These new styles were popularly known as "Art Deco", a term derived from the Decorative Arts Exposition of 1925 in Paris.

Despite this competition posters continued to thrive as a vital way of communicating messages to the masses.    The use of photography in posters became common-place.   Switzerland, for long a prominent player in the development of poster art and printing, was now to play a major role in the next stage of the poster evolution.

Although a relatively small country Switzerland nevertheless spoke and wrote 3 different languages which created many problems when designing posters, and a way had to be found to overcome these language difficulties and make posters more easily understood by everyone.     With the advent of World War II Switzerland's problems became a Universal problem, but it was the Swiss who provided the solution.

With typical Swiss sense of "precision" they developed an art style which came to be known as the "International Typographic Style".   Based on a mathematical grid, strict graphic rules and using black and white  photography the style created clarity and introduced the now, common-place, form of Company and Event Identification by logos and icons.

Simultaneously a different, more relaxed, approach to poster art was being adopted in other countries.    This approach was referred to as "Conceptual Image".   In America the "Conceptual Image" approach borrowed freely from Surrealism, Pop Art and Expressionism to create "vibrant, screaming, spectacular" posters including, for a short period, a craze for psychedelic posters.    This trait was adapted/adopted by the Polish School and by individuals such as Armando Testa of Italy, Gunter Rambow of Germany and Nicolas Troxler of Switzerland.

The International Typographic Style declined in use in the 70s and 80s and was replaced with "Post Modern" designs which were predominantly graphic in nature.   This change was to accelerate with advances in Computer Graphics, a process which is set to continue for the foreseeable future.