Video
Introduction"Selling" the War
Video
Introduction
A
color poster craze swept Europe and the United States during the 1890's. New
color printing techniques brought life to magazines and posters. It quickly
became evident that color posters could help sell and make popular a variety of
products.
Governments soon realized that posters might also be used to "sell"
patriotism
and other ideas during wartime. Artists from many nations created thousands of
posters during World War I. For example, posters were drawn to encourage people
to join the army, buy war bonds, conserve energy, help the wounded, be on the
lookout for spies, and so on.
Many posters created by governments contained propaganda, which is information
presented to favor or damage a particular point of view. Nations used propaganda
in many forms to further their own causes and to work against their enemies.
The war posters of each nation appealed to different emotions. However, all
tried to create a sense of patriotism for their own country. It is difficult to
measure the effectiveness of wartime posters in getting their messages across to
the people. Nevertheless, it is safe to say that posters aided the propaganda
efforts of many nations during World War I.