Riviera Cocktail

One of Webster Dictionary’s definitions of a Cocktail is “A mixture of diverse elements”

The French Riviera in the 1950’s & 60’s was the Ultimate Cocktail- La Riviera Francaise
a place where film stars & starlets, painters, sculptors, gamblers, ex-kings, jazz musicians, nobility, shipping magnets, directors, politicians, race car drivers, pin-up girls, conductors, writers, prima donnas, playboys, choreographers & film producers flocked to “The Mediterranean with its golden islands in the sun, with cloudless coasts and a magic sky” (translated from the Operette “Mediterrannee”)


The Golden Age of Graphic Design 1950’s- 60’s

After WWII many pilots went on to fly the propliners for commercial & travel airline companies. Soon they were flying to all points of the United States and around the world. By the 1950's flying was fun and fashionable. The airlines provided a means for an exciting escape on short notice or a long trip around the world. The "Mad Men" designed posters for the airlines to tempt you into travel to many exciting destinations here in the US and around the world.


Herbert Leupin: Stunning Graphics & Whimsy

Leupin was born in Beinwil am See Switzerland. From 1932 to 1935 he traind at Kunstgewerbeschul in Basel where he studied under such masters as Paul Kammuller, Herman Eidenbenz and Donald Brun. After graduation he did an internship at atelier Eidenbenz. Then from 1935-1936 he studied at L'Ecole Paul Colin in Paris. (Paul Colin master of the Art Deco poster and noted for discovering Josephine Baker)


Rene Gruau

is a renowned fashion illustrator whose portrayal of fashion design through painting has had a lasting effect on the fashion industry. Born Renato Zavagli Ricciardelli, in Rimini, Italy, his father was  an Italian count and his mother a French aristocrat. His parents separated when he was very young. As a child, Rene drew all the time. He never took any art lessons “I never studied drawing, never took any courses, I taught myself over many years…I always wanted to do posters. Advertising drawing…gives you the freedom to resolve visual problems which are almost always difficult but often varied and stimulating and always new.”


Women In Posters

The portrayal of women in posters, in fact in all advertising media, has remained a central subject for the last 125 years. As the technological tools available to marketers has advanced, the dominant use of the female persona to sell products and services has remained steady.


Alfonso Iannelli

born in the small town of Andretta, Italy, came to the U.S. at the age of 12, and approximately 5 years later won a scholarship to the Art Students League in New York. Adept at both painting and sculpture, he started his career in commercial graphic design, opening his own studio where, by 1907, he was contributing drawings to Harper's and The Ladies Home Journal.