Art for All British Posters for Transport Teri J. Edelstein, Teri J. Edelstein, Oliver Green, Neil Harris, Peyton Skipwith, Michael Twyman

In 1908 London Underground began a comprehensive publicity programme that became one of the most successful, adventurous, and best-sustained promotional operations ever attempted. The posters commissioned not only encouraged travel on the capital's burgeoning public transport system; they also helped to foster a civic identity for metropolitan London. The four national rail lines created in 1923, inspired by this example, created their own campaigns. This richly illustrated volume celebrates the designs, highlighting works that are among the triumphs of twentieth-century poster art. Designed to accompany an exhibition at the Yale Center for British Art, "Art for All" features more than one hundred works executed for the Underground and the railways. The exhibition and catalogue will explore the evolution of transport posters in twentieth-century Britain. It will feature the career of E. McKnight Kauffer, perhaps the greatest of these poster artists; the role of women designers; the printing techniques that brought the designs to life; and, the strategies of display developed by the transport systems. Both a visual delight and a work of scholarship, "Art for All" pays tribute to these extraordinary exploits in public design. Exhibition: Yale Center for British Art, 27 May - 15 August 2010.

Teri J. Edelstein is a former research fellow at the Yale Center for British Art. She now lives in Chicago, where she has been deputy director of the Art Institute and more recently has served as an international art consultant.

‘This handsome, illustrated book, despite its academic tone, offers a beguiling reminder of a vanished interwar world or bluebell woods, silent films and London weekenders immaculately dressed for the country in plus-twos and coloured waistcoats.’
-Matthew Denison, Daily Mail

‘This book with its own special magic evokes successfully a vanished world.’
-Richard Edmonds, Birmingham Post (Review)

‘Gorgeous coffee table book of annotated images together with a fulsome account of the British Transport system and its long affinity for art…This is a great souvenir for expats returning to Canada. Nor is it too early to consider this as the perfect Christmas gift for Anglophile relatives or as a sumptuous addition to your own book collection.’
-Paula Adamick, The Canada Post

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