86 / 254
CHARLES LOUPOT (1892-1962).
97
●
VOISIN AUTOMOBILES. 1923.
62
1
/
4
x47 inches, 158x119
1
/
2
cm. Devambez, Paris.
Condition A- / B+: replaced losses, repaired tears, creases and abrasions in margins; creases in image; margins
trimmed slightly.
In 1923, Gabriel Voisin, the luxury car manufacturer, commissioned Loupot (who had just returned to Paris
after years in Switzerland) to design a pair of posters promoting his automobiles. The results are two
dramatically different images. One is minimalistic, with a small red car against what is essentially an all-white
background. This second image is the exact opposite - a colorless car starkly highlighted against a vividly-
drawn, verdant forest depicted in a Cezanne-esque style. The effect these two images had was such that R.L.
Dupuy, the head of a prominent Parisian advertising agency at the time, remarked that the posters “dropped
like two stones in the frog-pond of the advertising imagination” (Weill p. 207). Loupot p. 60, Loupot /
Musee de l’Affiche no. 21, Reina Sofia p. 113.
[20,000/30,000]