HIGH ROLLERS

Graphic design festival will celebrate iconic prints from the past and give encouragement to a new generation of creative and gifted visual artists JEWEL IN THE CROWN

FROM Hello Boys to Labour Isn’t Working, ad posters pack a powerful punch.

The first caused car crashes as drivers’ concentration was diverted by hoarding images of Eva Herzigova in a push-up bra. The second helped elect Margaret Thatcher.

Later this month, Graphic Design Festival Scotland will give non-designers valuable insight into using words and images on enormous billboards.

An exhibition of posters from across the world, plus a workshop unpicking the various techniques, will give anyone with a photocopier the knowledge they need to spread their message far and wide.

Festival director James Gilchrist said: “We started the festival four years ago to reach out to the general public.

“We want to find people who aren’t designers but have the skills to use the power of visual communication.

“We explain the techniques and the processes behind the design works. These are useful tools for everyone and anyone.”

Here, the Record looks at some iconic advertising images from the past and present – and what makes them great. A POSTER from 1939 – designed to motivate an anxious nation for war – was rediscovered by a bookshop in the north-east of England in 2000. Thousands of mugs, T-shirts and parodies later, the original remains a masterclass in boiling the English stiff upper lip down into five words.