Every one of the 401 lots in Ewbank’s November 21st Vintage Posters auction sold, to amass a final total of £81,500, around 70% above the highest hopes for the sale.
Topping the white glove sale at a premium-inclusive £2,340 against hopes of just £80-120 was a rare 30 x 40 inch British Quad poster with artwork by Peter Strausfeld for the 1964 film The Red Desert. Starring Monica Vitti and Richard Harris, the film had won the Grand Prix Golden Lion at that year’s Venice Film Festival and was director Michelangelo Antonioni’s first feature filmed in colour.
The same price against an estimate of £200-400 was posted for another British Quad, for the 1988 cult clown comedy horror Killer Klowns from Outer Space. With artwork by Tom Stimpson, this was a scarce example of the full-size quad rather than the more commonly circulated smaller version.
Quads
Taking £1,690 against an estimate of £400-600 was a British Quad, British Lion 1st releaseposter for the classic 1974 horror film The Wicker Man, starring Christopher Lee. The same price was achieved for a British Quad designed by one of the most sought-after poster artists, Tom Chantrell, for Horror Express (1972), a sci-fi horror, starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing.
“This was an exceptional outing for vintage posters – there is clearly a ravenous appetite for this collecting field across nearly every genre of film-making,” said Ewbank’s Vintage Posters specialist, Maxwell Robinson. “Inch for inch they are some of the most competitively priced artworks across the whole art market. Their impact when framed and hung on a wall has to be seen to be believed.”
Images courtesy of Ewbank’s Auctions
