Real or fake ?

In the world of art and antiques, it is sometimes tempting to give in to the temptation of what seems to be a "good deal", but it is unfortunately much more common to come across a fake or a reproduction.

In addition to the more or less faithful reproductions, which are common in the world of old posters, it is also possible to come across ill-intentioned or unintentional sellers passing off (poor) reproductions as original posters on the internet.

What better than an example to illustrate this point?

In the 1970s, the illustrator Roger Soubie designed an advertising poster for the Bugatti brand, printed in lithography and now very rare and almost impossible to find in good condition. A copy of this poster has been found by Posterissim, and we would like to present you the details.

In image, the poster has everything of an original old poster: it is canvas, it presents some folds and signs of time, the credits such as the printer are well present, in short nothing alarming on a screen. Once in our hands, it is clear that it is a poor quality print of a photograph of the original vintage poster.
The folds are part of the image and the screen of the offset printing is coarse and perfectly visible.
The canvas has irregularities and air bubbles between the paper and the canvas, and is also retouched with... Gouache! - (see pictures at the bottom of the article)

The price of an original antique poster is justified by several aspects. We can talk about its rarity, its state of conservation, its age or its printing, but we must not forget the other guarantees that we benefit from when buying from a recognized professional seller, starting with the authenticity.

It is essential for www.posterissim.com to set fair prices, in accordance with the market and the characteristics of the poster, the details of which are listed on each product sheet. The prices of the posters on www.posterissim.com depend essentially on their purchase price and the means used for their acquisition (auction, travel, fairs, brokerage, exchanges, network...).
It is important to know, given the growing public interest in old posters, that beautiful posters are becoming rare and that their purchase price and therefore their resale price is increasingly high.

It is also important to keep in mind that with an original vintage poster, whether it is a movie poster, a travel poster or an advertising poster, you are buying a piece of history, which is both a mirror of time and a witness of its era.

Finally, and this is obviously not the case with the purchase of a reproduction, the purchase of an authentic poster is also a judicious "pleasure" investment that will increase in value with the years and whose resale potential is no longer to be proven.

On www.posterissim.com, you will only find posters in our collection, whose photographs were taken by us in our gallery in Brussels.
It is of course possible to visit us, by appointment, but also to ask for additional visuals that we will gladly provide in high resolution (overviews, details, credits...). It is important for us to provide the best possible service and to reassure any buyer as to the authenticity of each poster, which can, moreover, be provided with a certificate of authenticity on request.

Each photograph is retouched before being put online. It is simply cropped and the canvas is most often trimmed in order to highlight only what the poster represents.

It is particularly difficult to obtain a rendering faithful to the original poster for the following reasons:

- It is never a question of "cleaning" the poster by means of a computer program, nor of erasing its potential defects or its marks of time which make its essence and its charm.
The only possible retouching concerns the luminosity, which depends on the lighting of the room at the time of the photograph.

- Posterissim strives to put photos of its posters online with the best possible resolution, although this is not always optimal in order to maintain a good flow of navigation.
Also, depending on the quality and settings of your computer equipment (the screen in particular), you may have a significant difference between the image and reality.

- It is almost impossible to transpose on screen the reality of the beauty of a lithographic print.
It is important to keep in mind that an authentic poster will always be more beautiful (and often more impressive) once in hand, its colors being deeper and more vibrant.

The Posterissim team defends with passion and enthusiasm this unusual activity of buying and selling original vintage posters and will always do its best to make you prefer the original to the reproduction.
We know that you will not regret it and that you will be both proud and happy to offer or have at home an authentic poster.


NB: the images displayed on the site are the property of Posterissim and are protected by a discreet watermark.