brian cassidy bookselle

23.
[Marketing]: [Film]. GROSSMAN, David (Artist)
[21 Hand-Painted Cinematheque Film Posters]
(Philadelphia), (ca. 1970s-80s)
21 handmade signs (possibly maquettes) measuring 14” x 21.5” approx.
on stiff card. Some damp-staining and soiling. Touches wear
at edges. Light toning. Generally good to very good. Also includes a
program from the spring 1985 screening series measuring 14” x 8.5”
printed recto and verso. Three folds, else fine.
Signs made by David Grossman, pillar of the Philadelphia film community,
for the Temple University Cinematheque screening series, which
Grossman founded in 1974 and ran until 1989. Variously a theater
owner, 16mm collector, film history teacher (Joe Dante was among his
students), and impresario, Grossman was involved in the preservation
and exhibition of classic films for the better part of four decades.
Grossman pulled from his enormous collection of over 1,000 prints
for screenings at the Cinematheque. The titles represented in these
posters are classic repertory
fare, from CITIZEN
KANE to MEAN STREETS.
The artwork, though amateur,
shows the respect
for cinema that Grossman
was known for. Some
are original designs
that make use of film
stills and magazine cutouts
in combination with
hand-lettering and drawing,
while others attempt
to reproduce iconic
originals designs like
THE GODFATHER, ANATO-
MY OF A MURDER, or Saul
Bass's work for Hitchcock
films.
A lovingly-crafted example
of cinephilia at the
tail end of its college
and university heyday,
before home video reduced
movies to, as Sontag
wrote in her seminal
essay “The Decay of Cinema,”
“one of a variety
of habit-forming home
entertainments.”
-1850-
35