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Two Germanys, One Killer Poster Story
From the cool commercial polish of West German cinema advertising to the stranger, sharper, more experimental edge of East German poster art, this collection captures one of the great split-screen stories in vintage film design.
After the Second World War, Germany divided into West Germany and East Germany, two countries with two very different visual cultures. West German posters often leaned into bold typography, strong photographic elements, pop colour and slick cinema-going glamour. East German posters, produced behind the Iron Curtain from 1949 until reunification in 1990, frequently took a more artistic route: painterly, symbolic, surreal, sometimes stark, sometimes wildly expressive, with designers given room to interpret a film rather than simply sell it.
The result is a fascinating face-off between two poster worlds: West Germany with its punchy graphic modernism and East Germany with its moody, art-school electricity. Then, in 1990, as the country reunited, so did the design story. What remains is a brilliant visual archive of cinema, politics, pop culture and pure poster attitude.
Explore our original German and East German film posters, from 1960s classics through to the final years of the GDR.
Read more about the history of German Poster Design in our article When Germany Split the Screen: West & East German Film Poster Design.
