The colours of the flags

The abstraction of ‘nationalism’ in commercial advertisements: Leonetto Cappiello

Abstract

Leonetto Cappiello can be considered the precursor of modern advertising; following in the footsteps of the Frenchmen Jules Cheret and Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, with brilliant intuition, Cappiello found the answer to the two fundamental problems of the poster: legibility and recognition. The poster must contain only the essentials to be legible, which the author calls the search for the ‘spot’. To facilitate recognition, the colours used in the poster must be those that best strike the retina, thus enhancing the perception of the message. A line also creates a good poster, which must be decisive and concise; this must integrate with the colour as well as possible; furthermore, the details contribute to highlighting and enriching the image. The dark background of the scene is a novelty introduced by Cappiello; this makes the characters stand out and emerge from the black backgrounds; the colourful clothes of the figures are also rendered by playing with the contrasts of complementary colours. Sometimes, in his posters, to highlight the origin and typicality of a product, Cappiello adopts colour choices that recall the colours of national flags, especially in the advertisements for Italian and French products. We can, therefore, say that his innovative style defines the modern poster and will influence all poster designers of subsequent generations.