Social Democrats – Against Crisis and Need

Voilà the first Swiss political photographic poster, using a picture by Paul Senn (1901-1953), a representative of the young Swiss photographers who, from the early 1930s onwards, developed an own visual language by making people’s everyday lives their subject. Since Senn had opened a graphic design and advertising studio in Berne in 1928 and had a special affinity with the peasant population and the workers anyway, he was more than receptive when the Social Democrats asked him for help in creating a poster on the occasion of the parliamentary elections in 1931.

His (of course posed) shot of a serious-looking couple with their hands held high in unity, the catchy slogan (Against Crisis and Need – For Work and Bread; catchier in German than in English…) and the restrained design (both possibly also by Senn) make for a poster that still looks powerful today – and that is an early witness to the development in Swiss graphic design around 1930 towards more objectivity and less artistic distinctiveness.

maybe of interest as well:

Upwards through work – elect unionists and social democrates