“Art for the Cause: French Posters from the First World War” at the Charles Allis Art Museum reflects the domestic edge of the sword of war. Consider these posters as akin to advertisements for war bonds, securing loans in order to absorb the financial costs of military efforts.
The 12 works in this exhibition, produced during the Great War (1914-1918) and in its aftermath, are generally somber affairs that reveal strong connections to the traditions of French art. Produced as commercial pieces, they leap easily into the sphere of fine art through the skills of noted artists including Auguste Leroux and Théophile Steinlen. Even if the French language is not your forte, the captions on each are not a deterrent from their charged, illustrative qualities. The images transcend the language barrier by speaking in universal human codes of conflict, courage and sacrifice.
Abel Faivre seems to draw from the patrimony of the great Romantic artist Eugène Delacroix and his famous Liberty Leading the People, which was a rallying cry for liberté, égalité and fraternité in the morass of the July Revolution of 1830. Nearly 100 years later, Faivre’s On Les Aura! (translated in the exhibition as “Let’s Get ’Em”) features a solider whose wild eyes, open mouth and raised arm recall ancestors in Delacroix’s famous painting.
Designed with serious narratives in respect to the wartime situation, these posters elicit support by stirring emotions in the viewing public, and thereby loosening purse strings. The casts of characters are clear: Soldiers are strong and resolute and the home front is peopled by familiar archetypes of mothers and children. Leroux’s 3e Emprunt de la Défense Nationale combines these with clarity. A soldier outfitted in a long blue coat lifts a young girl, perhaps a daughter, as though saying goodbye. Alongside, almost as though a shadow or a dream, a woman drawn in soft grayscale nurses a baby at her breast. The implications are clear. Support for the war effort is not just about victory on the battlefield, but a fight that will shape the future of generations to come.
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Through July 12 at the Charles Allis Art Museum, 1801 N. Prospect Ave.
To see a video review of this exhibition, visit the A&E section of shepherdexpress.com
