Date: 1950s
Size: 46.5 x 66 inches
Artist: George Him
Cigarette companies have always been able to afford to spend a great deal of money on advertising their products. As far back as the 1920s when women were smoking as much (or more!) than men - companies like the now defunct Overstolz company used posters as a means to increase brand awareness.
Overstolz is a cigarette brand of the former Cologne cigarette company house Neuerburg, named after the old Cologny patrician family of Overstolzes. In the 1960s, German actor Heinz Engelmann became the face of the cigarette brand, starring in newspaper and television advertisements for them. The filter cigarettes were last produced in 2014 and since May 2015 are no longer available. Using a bright white background, this is a rare two-sheet, mid-century modern poster which is both decorative and quirky. It shows a knight in shining armor offering a cigarette to a woman on a typewriter... We love it!
This is an original, vintage poster from the 1950s in excellent condition and was recently mounted on linen.
About the artist: George Him was born in Lodz, Poland. He attended school in Warsaw and studied from 1917 to 1918 Roman Law at the State University in Moscow and comparative history of religions from 1920 to 1924 in Berlin and Bonn. Soon after, he began working as a graphic designer. During the Second World War, he designed posters for the British Ministry of Information, and also made illustrations for children's books and murals for commercial kitchens and canteens in factories.