Friday 11 April 2008

Lenin - Rostgaard 1970

This poster is a great example of the Cuban design aesthetic, taking a very serious subject and creating a wild, funky and psychedelic design with it. Rostgaard told me that he was trying to emulate the look of The Beatles' artwork with this poster. What is striking about the Cuban regime is that designers were allowed to be so playful with such serious subjects. In the Soviet Union turning Lenin into an extra from The Yellow Submarine could have had you sent to the Gulag. In Cuba it was just the way that poster designers celebrated the icons of communism.
OSPAAAL lenin rostgaard cuban poster

1 comment:

Bruno R. Matamoros said...

I find this one very interesting, it seems to be true that Cuban poster designers had freedom to portray serious subjects in any way they wanted. but still, the Beatles were banned from any public media by the government, and they could send you to jail if you listened to rock music, or your hair was long.

It probably was a matter of ignorance by the government of the psychedelic style they sometimes used.

Great poster collection by the way, before I left my country they published a catalog book with cuban posters, if you dont have it already and you are interested you might be able to find it through amazon or something. I dont recall the name.