Empire Buying Makes Busy Factories. Motor Manufacturing

On display

V&A South Kensington
Design 1900 to Now, Room 74

Artist/Maker	Empire Marketing Board (publisher) Gardiner, Clive (artist)
Place of origin	United Kingdom (published)

The Empire Marketing Board (1928-1933) was established to promote the products of the British Empire within the United Kingdom. The products were chiefly foodstuffs, but they included some industrial commodities too. The EMB was a major patron of graphic designers and film-makers. The design and content of the posters was self-consciously superior to those of advertisements. The EMB commissioned many well-known artists, including Edward Mcknight Kauffer and Gerald Spencer Pryse. Artists were asked to re-submit work that failed to display sufficient technical accuracy or which lapsed into fantasy. Clive Gardiner's strikingly modernist design was issued as part of a series of posters stressing the economic interdependence of Britain and its overseas Empire.

Object details

Categories	Propaganda Transport Prints Posters
Object type	Poster
Title	Empire Buying Makes Busy Factories. Motor Manufacturing (assigned by artist)
Materials and techniques	Colour lithograph Printing Ink Paper Colour Lithography
Brief description	One of a six part colour lithograph poster entitled 'Empire Buying Makes Busy Factories'. Designed by Clive Gardiner. Issued by the Empire Marketing Board. Great Britain. 1928.
Physical description	Landscape format colour lithograph poster featuring a Cubistic/semi-realist, semi-abstract design in predominantly reds, greys and ochre, of an industrial interior. In the foreground, three male figures (more or less equally spaced from left of centre to far right of the image) appear to be engaged in some manufacturing process.
Dimensions	Sheet height: 1005mm Sheet width: 1515mm Dimensions taken from: Summary Catalogue of British Posters to 1988 in the Victoria & Albert Museum in the Department of Design, Prints & Drawing. Emmett Publishing, 1990. 129 p. ISBN: 1 869934 12 1: 116.2 X 584.2 cm (overall size)
Styles	Modernist Cubist Cubist
Production type	Mass produced
Marks and inscriptions	......The Empire Marketing Board [partially obliterated] (Distributor's identification; left of bottom margin; lithography) Printed for HM Stationery Office by Waterlow & Sons Ltd. London, Dunstable & Watford. (Maker's identification; right of bottom margin; lithography) Clive Gardiner (Signature; within the image in lower left corner; lithography)
Gallery label	(2021) Man and machine The Empire Marketing Board (EMB) commissioned this poster in the late 1920s to promote industrially-produced goods from countries that formed part of the British empire. The short-lived EMB was established in an effort to boost trade between Britain and the countries it had colonised to sustain the empire. Portraying the factory as an industrious place of work, this dramatic image champions the partnership between man and machine. Poster celebrating automation ‘Motor Manufacturing’, 1928 Designed by Clive Gardiner Issued by the Empire Marketing Board, UK Colour lithograph Given by the Empire Marketing Board Museum no. E.443:1-1932 The object sits in the 'Automation and Labour' section of the Design 1900-Now gallery opened in June 2021.
Credit line	Given by the Empire Marketing Board
Production	One of a six part poster entitled 'Empire Buying Makes Busy Factories'. Reason For Production: Commission
Subjects depicted	Labour Industry Propaganda British Empire Factory Motor Vehicles
Summary	The Empire Marketing Board (1928-1933) was established to promote the products of the British Empire within the United Kingdom. The products were chiefly foodstuffs, but they included some industrial commodities too. The EMB was a major patron of graphic designers and film-makers. The design and content of the posters was self-consciously superior to those of advertisements. The EMB commissioned many well-known artists, including Edward Mcknight Kauffer and Gerald Spencer Pryse. Artists were asked to re-submit work that failed to display sufficient technical accuracy or which lapsed into fantasy. Clive Gardiner's strikingly modernist design was issued as part of a series of posters stressing the economic interdependence of Britain and its overseas Empire.
Associated objects	E.443:2-1932 (Set) E.443:3-1932 (Set) E.443:4-1932 (Set) E.443:5-1932 (Set) E.443:6-1932 (Set) E.323-1934 E.324-1934
Bibliographic references	Summary Catalogue of British Posters to 1988 in the Victoria & Albert Museum in the Department of Design, Prints & Drawing. Emmett Publishing, 1990. 129 p. ISBN: 1 869934 12 1 Victoria & Albert Museum Department of Prints and Drawings and Department of Paintings, Accessions 1932. London: HMSO, 1933
Collection	Prints, Drawings & Paintings Collection
Accession number	E.443:1-1932

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Record created	March 8, 2003
Record URL	https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O76313/empire-buying-makes-busy-factories-poster-gardiner-clive/

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