[Commlist] CFP - Picturing Cinema: How Movie Posters Shape Cinema Cultures

*Picturing Cinema: H**ow Movie Posters Shape Cinema Cultures*

*King’s College London*

*Wednesday 12*^*th* * – Thursday 13*^*th* * May 2027*

Keynote Talk: Sir Christopher Frayling (Royal College of Art) with Tony 
Nourmand (Reel Art Press)

Before social media campaigns, before television commercials, and even 
before trailers, movie posters were used to advertise films and attract 
audiences to cinemas. Taking advantage of advances in lithography, 
design, and printing that began in the late nineteenth century, posters 
quickly became one of the primary and most visible forms of film 
advertising. Through colour, typography, and graphic art, posters 
promoted film genres, stars, plots, special effects, production 
companies, and many other aspects of movies. In effect, the poster 
distilled a film’s appeal – or, in some cases, its /assumed/ appeal – 
into the text and images that could be contained on a single sheet of paper.

As physical objects, movie posters have their own material histories, 
shaped by the paper on which they are printed, the techniques through 
which they are produced, and the spaces in which they are displayed, 
collected, and preserved. In some cases, movie posters are one of the 
few remaining remnants of films that no longer survive. Yet the movie 
poster has not disappeared with the emergence of digital forms of film 
promotion. In an era of streaming platforms, online distribution, and 
social media, posters continue to play a significant role in the 
marketing and circulation of films, even as their modes of production 
and dissemination have been transformed.

Despite their significant role within cinema history, movie posters 
remain a curiously understudied topic within film and media studies 
scholarship. While numerous coffee-table books have documented and 
reproduced collections of movie posters, the academic study of the movie 
poster remains surprisingly limited. This relative neglect may in part 
reflect the poster’s longstanding association with advertising and 
commercial culture, alongside a tendency to regard its promotional 
function as self-evident rather than as something requiring sustained 
critical analysis.

This two-day in-person conference at King’s College London invites 
scholars to consider what methods we can use to research and study the 
movie poster. This might include consideration of where and for whom a 
poster was produced; who designed, commissioned, and distributed it; the 
industrial, cultural, and political contexts in which it was created; 
where, when, and how it was displayed; its relationship to the film and 
its wider promotional campaign; its reception and circulation; and its 
subsequent afterlife as a collectible, archival object, and cultural 
artefact. We are particularly interested in papers that consider the 
role of public and private movie poster collections in shaping our 
understanding of posters, including questions of collecting, 
cataloguing, preservation, fandom, access, and provenance.

We aim to bring scholars working across film studies, visual culture, 
art history, and related fields into dialogue with each other.

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

  * The history and development of the movie poster
  * The work of individual poster artists and designers, such as Saul
    Bass, Hans Hillmann, Boris Grinsson, Tom Chantrell, Barbara (Basha)
    Baranowska, Tongdee Panumas, and Akiko Stehrenberger, as well as
    lesser-known and anonymous practitioners
  * The relationship between individual authorship and the collaborative
    and industrial processes through which posters are designed and 
produced
  * The movie poster as an art object, cultural artefact, and/or commodity
  * Posters in relation to histories of film promotion, cinema-going,
    and exhibition cultures
  * Materiality, production, and printing technologies
  * How posters construct stars, filmmakers, genres, and other aspects
    of film culture
  * Posters and the representation of race, ethnicity, gender, and 
sexuality
  * National and regional traditions of poster design
  * Transnational circulation and cultural translation of film posters
  * Poster collecting, fandom, and the afterlife of posters
  * Posters in the digital era, including digital design, online
    circulation, and alternative movie posters
  * Archives, museums, private collections, preservation, and provenance

Please submit an abstract of 300-500 words including 5 references to 
scholarship or archival material your paper will engage with, along with 
a short biographical note (up to 100 words) through our _Google Form_ 
<https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe1zlx_R-mNyb5k4srWCj4m4nQqYnMrv2w2tr8k3vuH3m_oCA/viewform?usp=sharing&ouid=116720482656342508684>

If you have any questions, please contact us via email at: 
(picturingcinema /at/ gmail.com)

**

*Deadline for submissions: *

Tuesday 1^st  December.

Successful applicants should expect to be notified by Friday 18^th 
 December.

Conference Organisers: Iain Robert Smith (King’s College London) and 
Martin L. Johnson (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
---------------
The COMMLIST
---------------
This mailing list is a free service offered by Nico Carpentier. Please use it responsibly and wisely. The commlist has no responsibility for any damage caused by its postings. Subscription to the list automatically implies agreement with this rule.
--
To subscribe or unsubscribe, please visit http://commlist.org/
--
Before sending a posting request, please always read the guidelines at http://commlist.org/
--
To contact the mailing list manager:
Email: (nico.carpentier /at/ commlist.org)
URL: http://nicocarpentier.net
---------------