Table of series Table sources •
La vie du collectionneur, n° 170 •
Cartes postales and collection, n° 116 •
imuseejob.free.fr website and La vie du collectionneur, n° 390 The 32nd drawing corresponded to the 1916 calendar by painter
Eugène Loup, listed by Italian author Carmello Calò Carducci in 1987. The 1910 (A) series was printed horizontally, with the words "Collection JOB" (JOB collection), but no printer's mark or "cigarettes JOB" (JOB cigarettes) label. The background is squared. This series is available in two paper qualities: linen and smooth satin. Print quality is good on the rough paper, fair for those on the smooth satin paper. The 1910 (B) series is horizontal, and differs from the 1910 (A) series in that "lyon" is the name of the printer's town where the cards were produced by "Art couleurs".
1911 series This series most certainly included 24 postcards, i.e. all production up to 1911 except for Rassenfosse. The paper is rough and the printing quality, acceptable. This series is said to be subject to certain peculiarities: the 1910 Gervais calendar was mistakenly dated 1911, and the text on the Ng Duc Thuc card was adapted. The printing date of this card is not known with certainty (1914?). Some of Cappiello's postcards differ from the 1914 series in minor ways: no outline on the front, or no inscription on the reverse. This is linked to the period reprints of this "successful" card. • Other cards Just as there is a large-format, vertical Gervais 1905 calendar postcard dating from around 1914, it's difficult to be exhaustive, as postcard issues were undoubtedly made elsewhere, but very sporadically.
Brief description of series works Each creation in the series was initially published as a calendar, and sometimes as a poster. The calendar was generally printed on cardboard, or at least on reinforced paper, with an
ephemeris of the year notched into the cardboard, which has often been leafed through and disappeared. Posters were printed on paper, sometimes in deluxe editions. The poster or calendar, at least the first print run, often included the advertising slogan "Smoke with JOB or don't smoke" in the language of the poster's destination, the "JOB" trademark, sometimes a reference to "out of competition, Paris 1889" (or 1900), and was often decorated with a harmonious border. The reference to the
Paris Universal Exhibition of 1889 or
1900 indicated that the JOB brand was "out of competition", meaning it won a medal. This clarification is important, as biographers have sometimes believed that the date corresponded to a medal received by the artist himself. Other prints followed without any mention, with only the decorative image; this was also the case for the proofs before the letter, often found in the collections of old printing works. The printer's mark was often present, especially for quality prints, often the former Cassan or Sirven artistic printers, both of which had branches in Toulouse and Paris. It's important to distinguish these vintage
lithographic prints from the more recent
offset reproductions that have been in vogue for the last ten years or so, and to bear in mind that these posters, which were intended for advertising purposes and are by no means cabinet prints, were often printed in different sizes and qualities in their day. Here is a brief description of the works. •
1895 Bouisset poster. Firmin Bouisset, the specialist in children's advertising (he was the father of the famous Menier chocolate poster), began the JOB series with a little chimney sweep, black with smoke, whose connection with the brand was hard to see. It was used on posters, now rare, but not in calendars. •
1895 Meunier Calendar. This was the first female JOB in the series. According to the inscription on the postcards, this was originally a calendar, but it has to be said that almost all of them have now disappeared. The corresponding period poster, large in size (approx. 240 × 87 cm), was printed by Chaix; it was intended more for lining city walls than for interior decoration. Other posters have more modest formats, but are nevertheless larger than later creations by other illustrators; given the various formats encountered, we can deduce that this successful design was the subject of numerous print runs. •
1896 Chéret calendar. Proudly displaying a cigarette, this moving woman, whose back can be seen, was typical of Chéret's elegant and cheerful creations, and was thus "La Chérette" from the JOB collection. On the small-format calendar, the design was highlighted by a decorative border: the zigzag motif used on the brand's cigarette-paper notebooks, a motif that was to be used again and again by poster artists. The design, without the frieze, was used again for an imposing 1.20-meter-high poster by Imprimerie Chaix. An icon of the "advertising woman", a
pin-up before her time, all the elements were in place to make this calendar the emblematic centerpiece of the JOB collection. After seducing Art Nouveau enthusiasts at the beginning of the 20th century, it was rediscovered in the 1960s by
Psychedelic enthusiasts, and is still used and adapted today in countless works and derivative products. This calendar was the subject of numerous poster prints in slightly different shades. For his second creation,
La femme brune, Mucha was inspired by a fresco by Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel. The exuberant hair, typical of Mucha, remained, as did numerous allusions to the JOB brand, from the brooch to the cigarette-paper case and even the background as wallpaper. A third poster by Mucha remained in the draft stage. The plates were printed in Paris by F. Champenois. •
1897 Atché poster. The young Jane Atché – she was only 24 when she imagined this subject – was the only woman to contribute to the collection. for a print run the following year, the stylized representation of a woman smoking and the contrasting colors make this poster a remarkable work. Its refined graphics evoke Toulouse-Lautrec or Japanese prints. The woman imagined by Jane Atché smoked with natural simplicity and elegance, in her large black cape, her hair wisely up. The calendar print, with its high-quality colors and gilding, was produced by the Sirven artistic printing house in Toulouse. Given its success, it was systematically reproduced on postcards and posters. After the ''Femme rousse à l'orchidée'', Maxence did it again in 1903, depicting a woman with a cigarette in a boat against a watery backdrop of water lilies. Finally, for his third calendar, Maxence, as usual, depicted a woman in a plant world. •
1902, 1904, 1905, 1909, 1910, 1911 and 1912 Gervais calendars. Gervais was the most prolific of the painters in the JOB collection, his creations spanning some ten years. The artist liked to depict pretty women with flowers blooming in their hair: everything was a pretext for using a colorful palette, and Woman with a Garland of Flowers 1902 was his first contribution. Relatively rare: she wasn't smoking, so the advertisement could be used for products other than cigarette paper. Two years later, the painter from Toulouse drew his second JOB woman. This woman in a hat, holding a carnival mask near a light, was the medium for a pleasant calendar. For his third contribution, Gervais remained in the register of the flower woman, which he had already interpreted for the 1902 calendar. In 1909, he again depicted a woman with flowers in her hair, in keeping with the traditional representation of the 1900 woman. In 1910, it was the turn of a woman wearing a mantilla, in 1911 a pretty calendar of a woman carrying a vase, and in 1912 a woman smoking, again in a setting of flowers on an aquatic background, one of his most successful works. •
1906 Duvocelle calendar. Portrait painter Duvocelle depicted a woman in profile for his only contribution to the collection. Only the woman's face, hands and especially the cigarette were pale, while the clothes and background were very dark. The complete calendar was distributed with the 1906 ephemeris, the drawing was dated 1905 and there were generally no printer's marks; the calendar also featured a wide imitation wood border, which was not repeated on the postcards. As for Devambez, its competitor, its aggressive sales practices also favored the large print runs of Cappiello, its
protégé. The fact remains that, despite these relatively large print runs, the poster remains highly collectible among lovers of fine images, and its value is reflected in its price. •
1914 Duc Thuc poster. This original and very rare poster by Nguyen Duc Thuc is atypical in the collection. Depicting a Chinese scene, it bore, on a wide upper band, the drawing of an unrolled parchment bearing the words "la grande marque française JOB" (the great French brand JOB), demonstrating the company's growing importance in the export market. •
1915 Hervé calendar. This wartime calendar featured a woman in a red suit imitating a uniform jacket. The calendar is quite rare, and the postcard, from the latest 1916 series, is almost impossible to find. •
1916 Loup calendar. Eugène Loup's JOB woman was finely processed in brown cameo tones. This was a very rare presentation in which the pensive JOB woman (this was wartime) was not smoking. The calendar, whose print run was small, generally lacked a printer's mark. The postcard, which obviously only existed in the last series (1916), is very rare.
Other creations Other posters, which are rarely referenced and quoted, are listed here. As they were not printed on postcards, they do not benefit from the remarkable memory offered by this widely distributed medium, that of a widely collected image with the advantage of small format. A development on the comparison between postcard and poster collecting around 1900, specialized directories and postcard series devoted to posters (Cinos, Gérin, Job, Chemins de Fer posters). They are no less interesting, especially as they are sometimes the work of important illustrators. poster == In 20th-century art ==