AIR FRANCE AND BEZOMBES…..
A set of twelve avant garde posters that nearly didn’t see the light of day because of the “selection committee”!!!!!
In the early 70’s Bezombes put together this revolutionary set of Posters for Air France. They were no longer showing destinations but “concepts”, concepts linked with the mystery and joy of air travel, a flow of images that could stand alone or interact with each other.
Roger Bezombes (1913-1994) better known for his sculptures, paintings and other media created this new idea. Heavily influenced by surrealism and artist such as Braque he created images of gastronomy, desert islands, aviation, freedom, the orient, the planet. They were presented to Air France.
From 1974 the “Artistic” displays created for Air France was controlled by a “selection committee”, This committee frowned on these posters done by Bezombes as being “too modern” “too strange” and were generally not following the Air France direction/brand.
The President of AF, Pierre Giraudet, however saw this project, appreciated it and asked Gerard Orizet to take this project on board. This however took 7 years of cajoling, persuading before it came to fruition in 1980.
They were officially unveiled in 1981 at the Beaubourg museum in Paris.
In continuation of Bezombes’s idea of creating something out of the ordinary so was the printing of them. Each have between 14 and 20 colours, They were photographed from lithographs and then printed by offset and serigraphy.
The set of twelve is offered as a set or individually
