Sanghaji art deco plakátok
Chinese Vintage Pin Up Posters of the 1920's-30's
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A new form of advertising that developed early in the 20th century in China was the calendar poster. Major companies would present these calendars as gifts to their clients at the beginning of the Chinese New Year. These posters usually had a large glossy image in the middle with calendars for one or two years on the sides. While strikingly different in content and style, this method of marketing does have its roots in the tradition of Chinese folk prints, colorful pictures exchanged at the New Year. The subject matter of such prints usually drew from a body of popular folklore and auspicious symbols. In contrast, calendar posters presented new cosmopolitan images targeted at the growing urban middle class.

"Shanghai Girlie Posters or Yuefenpai Calendar Posters were used to sell everything from beer to soap. The models were both idealised western girls as well as real Chinese stars illustrating Shanghai's love affair with Hollywood. In 1994 these posters were fetching over $1000 in Singapore."
Taken from The World of Interiors, April 2000.

Vintage Shanghai posters have in recent years become a much sought-after item among enthusiasts of Oriental collectibles. Shanghai posters had models extolling the virtues of everything from Sunmaid Raisins and Tiger Balm to Sunlight Soap and many brands of cigarettes such as White Horse, Camel, Viceroy and Hatamen.

These "Shanghai posters" typically originated in the early 1900s and were used to advertise products and services.

Well-known film actresses often posed prettily in elegant cheongsams against the backdrop of idealized gardens or home settings.

Some of the companies advertising their products had "house models." The same girls almost always appeared in their advertisements.

The Oriental poster girls were adopted after purely Western advertisements used in London and New York were met with indifference from the local people.

The poster calenders published in the earlier years of the Republic of China (1912-49) had a mild flavour of women's liberation, showing women with bound feet walking outdoors with their children.

In the 1920s poster calenders, women had thin eyebrows and narrow eyes in reserved poses with obvious traces of the aesthetic tastes left over from the Qing Dynasty.

The most interesting poster calenders were probably those published in the 1930s, a time of comparative stability and great wealth with a bourgeoisie that had expensive foreign tastes.

This was clearly depicted in the gorgeously painted women lounging in art deco settings, clad in resplendent cheongsams.

In those years, "multiple children and wealth" were synonymous with happiness. So in many poster calenders, beautiful and trendy taitais (wives) were pictured with several children to present a wholesome family image that gently urged viewers to try the advertised product.

The "Hollywood Look" of the time was obvious from the short, crimped hairstyles, femme fatale makeup and sometimes comically contrived poses of the models.

Besides the commercial purposes, these poster girls were in fact trend setters, they propagated desired lifestyles and reflected prevailing values. The poster girls did not confine themselves to the home: they played golf and rode bicycles atop hills.

Some poster girls nearly bared all to help promote a product. Some were in risque poses and their attire and attitudes seem incongruously un-Chinese.

It was this perceived "Western decadence" that led to most of these posters being destroyed during the fervour of the "cultural revolution" (1966-76). The ones we see today are the few that survived the hooligan vandals of that era.

Joshua Shi

WHERE THERE'S SMOKE…

Long before corporate gifts became fashionable, cigarette posters - mainly in the form of calendars - were already a popular promotional give-away. Let me show you the unique legacy of a dying habit

In many countries, it all started with timepieces, the mania for collecting fuelled by the value of antique and modern watches soaring to an all-time high. At a lower price range come old writing instruments and lighters, their popularity almost matching those of pricier collectibles.

Also time-warped, but of no apparent value are objects that are collected more for fun and nostalgia, or as a hobby: matchboxes, coke bottles and old cigarette packets. Small objects not destined to enter the big league, though whimsical and fun.

The newest addition to the range is considerably more of an objet d'art. Cigarette and sundry posters from China, printed mainly in Shanghai and Tsingdao, the posters are conclusive proof that marketing and promotions were alive and thriving in China six or more decades ago.

The advertising posters, mostly printed on imported paper, come in a scroll format and were actually among the first batch of colour printed matter produced in China after World War 1. As well as being attractive gifts, most doubled as calendars, a feature that makes them relatively easy to date.

Companies who commissioned the posters came from as far afield as England, the United States, Switzerland Russia and Japan, with the great majority involved in the tobacco industry, including such big names as Camel, Viceroy (know by the previous Chinese name meaning 'big fairy"), and the now defunct Hatamen, an English tobacco concern. Others included the famous Hong Kong toiletries firm of Kwong Sang Hong, and the aspirin giant, Bayer.

An accurate reflection of the society of the time, especially of Shanghai, then regarded as the Paris of the East, the posters provide a fascinating study of the fashion trends and lifestyles of the period. Often, they featured well-known celebrities and movie stars posing prettily in elegant cheongsams against the backdrop of idealized gardens, sometimes in the company of children to present a wholesome family picture and gently persuade the recipient to try out the advertised product. Apart from the nostalgia obviously associated with the posters, the high standard of design and printing in China in the 20s and 30s, are good reasons for their current popularity among collectors. Needless to add, they also serve as quaint legacies of the days when smoking was considered fashionable and sophisticated.

On the other hand, some companies preferred to take a more literary approach, using illustrated posters of Chinese mythology. Others turned the table around, and featured overseas Chinese. One such poster features Chinese quintuplets of Canadian immigrant parents.

Being gift items of no monetary value and with only a limited time span (especially in the case of calendars), few have survived with time,hence their rarity and value as collectibles. The oldest in my collection is a 1920 calendar given out by the Shanghai Fire & Marine Insurance Co Ltd, while the most unique were those from Japanese newspaper company and the Mentholatum which is still commonly used after 6 decades.

The posters should have a particular appeal to people in advertising, marketing, and other media-related industries, as well as collectors who merely want to take a trip down memory lane. Additionally, since the deadly weed is fast being snuffed out, smokers - both current and reformed - may find them a fitting memento to a dying habit.